


Few Things Hard To Kill

by deansrightfulangerissue (babybluecas)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Aggression, Alternate Season/Series 06, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Animal Death, Animal blood drinking, Archery, Assisted Suicide, Blood, Blood Drinking, Canon Universe, Canon-Typical Violence, Coping, Depression, Dreams and Nightmares, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Exsanguination, F/M, Female Character Death, Forgiveness, Godstiel - Freeform, Godstiel/Dean Winchester - Freeform, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Hallucinations, Healing, Hopeless Dean Winchester, Hunters & Hunting, Hurt, I'm so sorry Lisa ily, Loss of Control, POV Dean Winchester, Rats, Self-Harm, Self-Loathing, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Swearing, Vampire Dean Winchester, Vomiting, child witnessing parent's death, godstiel is an asshole, happy ending is relative, one-sided Castiel/Dean Winchester, partial decapitation, pulling out fangs, self-imposed seclusion, self-punishment, self-starving, violent impulses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-04
Packaged: 2020-10-06 15:02:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20508965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/babybluecas/pseuds/deansrightfulangerissue
Summary: After Dean gets turned into a vampire, he goes home to say goodbye to Lisa. But things go awry: his newfound bloodlust takes over, his fangs sink into Lisa’s neck. He drinks until his love dies in his arms.Fully transformed and plagued by guilt, Dean looks for repentance in death.But his desperation isn't enough—for what he's done, he doesn't get the easy way out.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written fo [SPN Dark Fic Bang 2019](spndarkficbang.tumblr.com). Thanks to the awesome mods for running this cool challenge!
> 
> Check out the [amazing art](https://amberdreams.livejournal.com/621950.html) by lovely Amberdreams!
> 
> Huge, huge, huuuge thanks to [heylittleangel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heylittleangel) for all the patience, enduring my complaining and my stupid questions, and for all the support you've given me <3 And, of course, for being a great, quickly reading beta. Thanks <3
> 
> Also, thanks to [tco](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tco) for the badass title.
> 
> And to the awesome folks over at the Writers of Destiel for the support.
> 
> Ily all, y'all ♥

Isn’t she beautiful when she sleeps? So vulnerable in the moonlight. So unaware of the danger that crept into her bedroom. She still dreams happy dreams, the corner of her lips twitches to their rhythm. Her chest, barely covered with the white fabric of her pjs, still rises and falls with each even breath.

He could just stand there, he could watch her all night. It’s his last, after all—his last night alive. If he can even call himself that, anymore.

The ending is not what he’d imagined it would be.

But at least it won’t be painful, not as ugly as could be. And he gets to say goodbye. If he dares.

Or he could just stand there for just a little bit longer. Before disappearing, for good, as they both knew he would, eventually.

That way, he’d never have to be the one who breaks Lisa’s heart.

Never be the one to bring her the bad news. For a few more days, she’d keep her peace. Radio silence’s never killed anyone’s hope yet. Sam was always better at this stuff, anyway. At bringing the bad news to the girlfriends, bringing comfort to the bereaved wives. He’s practiced well, all those years in their make-believe FBI.

Or maybe Sam wouldn’t have the decency, and Lisa’d call and she’d call and she’d give up, at last. Isn’t that how all those stories end, where a girl brings a drifter under her roof? She’d be sad, sure. She’d be pissed at him—and that he deserved.

Maybe a part of her would wait for him to come back, but she’d never hold her breath.

And then she’d move on, and that would be that for their little love story.

A dog barks outside, the wretched noise thundering in Dean’s ears. He forces it out of his mind and focuses all his attention on Lisa, on her face, trying to etch it into his brain, so that, when the moment comes, when the silver blade of the machete swings towards his neck, he can recall it, as she is now, let it be the last thing he sees before his head rolls to the dirty motel floor.

No, he can’t think about that, not now. This is about her. About everything she’s done for him.

That’s what he came here for. That’s why he drove all the way here, the road hazard that he was in his condition (a condition, what a funny word for becoming a monster). The lights of passing cars were so blinding he barely managed to keep his eyes on the road. The lovely purr of Baby’s engine, once his favorite sound, was drowning him, grating like a thousand nails on a chalkboard.

Somehow, he made it here in one piece. For Lisa.

Now he’ll get to touch her soft, pulsing skin.

But he doesn’t get to move. The fucking barking outside wakes her up—

It’s his view that startles her. A stranger in her room.

No, not a stranger.

She doesn’t know that yet.

“Dean.”

“Hey,” he lets out.

She flicks on the lamp on the nightstand; a freakin’ firework straight into his eyes. He turns his face away. At least it’s something to take his mind off her thundering heartbeat.

“Hey.” She rubs the sleep away from her eyes. “I wasn’t expecting you for a couple of days.”

They have just talked about it, about him coming home soon. Now, the conversation feels like a lifetime ago.

“Yeah, yeah. I wanted to see you.”

He sits down on the bed. Not his greatest idea. He’s too close. He can’t even look at her.

“Are you okay?”

“Listen—”

“What’s going on?”

The concern in Lisa’s voice is killing him. So is her scent, as she moves closer.

“It doesn’t matter. But I need you to know—you and Ben—just, uh…” He should have had the speech prepared. He thought he had. But there are too many thoughts racing through his head. He’s got too much to tell her. He needs more time with her. So much more time. But he has to settle for a simple, honest, “Thanks. Okay? For everything.”

“Dean,” she says—she begs—slipping from under the covers, moving even closer, “you’re scaring me.”

He can’t stand the pounding of her heart anymore.

He can’t stand the closeness. The hypnotizing scent of her blood—the kind of temptation he’s never felt, never resisted, before.

As she leans towards him, he pulls away, stands up. He needs to put distance between them, as much as he can, as fast as he can.

“Oh, God, I’m Pattinson.” He wishes it was nothing but a dumb joke. He wishes it was embarrassing, not terrifying.

“What?”

“Nothing. I gotta go.”

“No, you can’t just show up here like this and—”

She’s so bent on being close to him, she gets up and follows him. He can’t blame her. Coming here was a bad idea. All he does is make it harder and more confusing for her.

“Believe me, I wish it was different.”

“Just stop, and explain to me what’s going on out there.”

Dean pauses.

Don’t think about her heartbeat.

Don’t think about her pulse.

He wants to tell her everything. He needs her to understand. So that, maybe, once he’s gone, she doesn’t hate him.

He wants to tell her he was wrong; about jumping back into the life like a fucking boomerang, though he once swore he was done hunting. He could have just stayed with her, full time. They could have had so much more time.

Most of all, he wants to tell her how afraid he is. He’s played tag with death for most of his life. But nothing could have prepared him for the real thing. For the no-coming-back-this-time thing.

He might have acted tough in front of Sam, but he doesn’t wanna go.

And where will he go, anyway? Like this? Not heaven, that’s for sure. He can only hope there’s no special circle of hell for monsters like him.

A big, fat nothing always seemed like a good idea.

“Lisa, I can’t bring this crap home to you.”

“You’re talking about your work?”

“I’m talking about my  _ life _ . It’s ugly...and it’s violent...and I’m gonna die—soon.”

She doesn’t understand. How could she?

“Just tell me,” she pleads, coming closer, too close. “Just tell me what the hell is going on.”

She’s got her hands wrapped around his arms. Her face, her body, inches away. And Dean can’t back out any further.

He can’t stand it anymore.

He can’t stand it. He can’t.

He grabs her shoulders and pushes her against the wall, rough, too rough. Eyes narrowed, he watches the fear in her eyes.

The fear. The arousal.

Heavy breath, racing heartbeat.

The last remnants of her trust in him don’t let her fight back, don’t let her scream or try to run away. She’s waiting for his move. For his lips moving closer to her lips. For his tongue finding her tongue. For his hands sliding up her thighs. For the touch, the love, the fucking. For something that says this has all been an act, a game.

For anything that doesn’t sound like goodbye.

Dean can’t give her that. He can only take. He can only devour.

Craves to—

Wants to—

The scent, the rush of blood under her skin, there’s nothing else beside it. There’s nothing but that red, burning, overpowering desire.

His lips don’t touch her lips.

They move lower.

Down her jaw. Down her neck.

There’s the artery, the thick river of blood, waiting for him. Waiting for the thing that’s in control of him, the animal that’s taken over.

He can’t do this.

He has to stop.

He has to stop!

But her skin gives in so easily.

And her blood tastes so sweet.

Sweeter than wine, sweeter than pie with whipped cream, sweeter than her love’s ever been, Lisa’s blood erupts into Dean’s mouth. Suddenly, he’s Tantalus, straight off his torment, and he swallows, and swallows, and swallows ravenously. Doesn’t care if it drowns him; the taste—oh God, that taste—is well worth dying for.

Worth killing for.

Worth living for.

Envious of each stray drop that escaped his tongue, Dean can’t stop taking her in. It’s addictive, it’s intoxicating.

And it works. It quenches the hunger, at last, quiets the noise, eases the pain of constant endurance.

Until different pain breaks in, though not his own. A terrified scream of a terrified child. And two weak arms trying to pry Dean away from his favorite drug, from his love.

His love.

His love falling through his arms. Her body limp, head rolled back on her bloodied neck.

What has he done?

“No!”

Her skin’s pale, near white in dim light. When Dean lifts her head up to look at a sign of life in her eyes, her eyes stare right back, cold.

Dean’s knees rattle against the floor.

“No!”

Laid down like that, more akin to an apparition than a person, this cannot be her. This cannot be Lisa.

Lisa cannot be dead.

But he killed her. God, he killed her.

“No, no, no, no!”

He has to wake up. If he only gets to open his eyes, everything will be fine. He had this nightmare before, the nightmare in which Lisa was dead. Killed by a monster.

This is all it is. Another nightmare. Another monster.

But she never looked like this in those dreams.

“Come on, Lis. Come on, wake up, please!”

He puts one hand on her throat, blocking the narrow stream of blood from seeping out of her, the other on her chest, pressing on her ribs to a broken rhythm. Work, it has to work, it has to—

But the heartbeat that drove Dean crazy just moments ago is gone. Completely gone.

“Let go of her! Let go!”

He’s not alone there—not just with her. The grasp of small hands that failed to save has now turned into a hail of punches. They sting. Ben’s presence stings more.

He saw everything.

The murder of his mother. Dean’s mouth still dripping with her blood.

“Ben.”

“Let go of her!” Ben repeats, like they’re the only words he can get out.

And Dean lets go of her and moves out of Ben’s way. There’s nothing else he can do. Lisa’s dead. She’s dead. He killed her.

Ben can’t do anything either. Not with his tears, not with his desperate cries, not with hands, trying to shake his mother awake.

Lisa’s blood smears on the buttons of Dean’s cellphone as his shaking fingers try to push the right ones. It’s the best thing he can do for Ben. He can’t let him stay with her body ‘til morning if he’s too shaken to get to the phone.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?” asks a voice on the other end.

“There’s been an acc—” No. It was not an accident. “There’s been a murder,” he corrects.

His eyes move from Ben’s heaving form to Lisa, spread on the floor like a big, white-and-red rag doll that he’s leaving for the cops to clean up.

What a poetic ending to Dean’s little love story. The only ending he was ever gonna get, isn’t it?

“I—I murdered her.”

He gives them the address and pockets his phone. He’s got ten, maybe fifteen minutes of a head start. Maybe less. He needs to get moving if he doesn’t want to get caught. He has to flee his own fucking crime scene like it’s some damn hit and run.

He has to leave Ben. Leave Lisa.

They deserved so much better.

And Dean deserves prison. He deserves a guillotin. Maybe that’s why his legs fail to move. Maybe that’s why he’s stuck where he stands, unable to tear his eyes away from Lisa’s dead stare.

Until Ben’s snarled words don’t steal his attention, his face twisted with rightful wrath.

“I swear I’m gonna find you and kill you.”

Ben means it, Dean’s got no doubt about it. And it’s not the kill part that worries him, not really. Dean’ll be long, long dead by then. But Dean’s seen revenge, seen where that path leads and it’s ugly. Blood on Ben’s hands, hollowness in his heart—that’s the last thing Dean ever wanted for the kid.

But he’s already got blood on his hands and it’s all Dean’s fault.

“Don’t go down that road,” Dean pleads, but Ben won’t listen, of course he won’t. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

What else can he say?

And just like that, Dean leaves the love of his life dead on the floor, the distraught kid he once called his son by her side. He leaves everything that was worth living for, everything he destroyed.

And he runs.

He doesn’t get to drive far before the sirens pass by him. They’re not even that loud. Not when the sweet, sweet taste of Lisa’s blood subdues every other sensation. Well, he sure understands vampires a whole lot better now.

He forces his foot to stay on the gas pedal. He can’t stop now. Though everything inside him tells him to stop, to turn around. To see if they’re taking good care of Ben. If they’re gentle with Lisa.

But turning around would mean getting caught, and for Dean, prison, would mean never getting what he deserves for what he’s done.

So he drives. And drives, until the adrenaline wears off. And then it hits him,  _ really _ hits him what he’s done. And then it’s too much and all at once.

He killed Lisa.

The weight constricts his chest, has him gasping for air, as his hands squeeze the wheel. The tears well up and well up and pour out of his eyes, his vision blurred, the lights of coming cars turn into white streaks.

And his stomach revolts—his stomach filled with Lisa’s blood.

The gravel grinds and scatters under the wheels, as the car swerves into the byway and stops. Dean spills out of the seat and onto the ground, barely makes it to the side of the road before hurling. His fingers twist into long grass as the blood, the bile, the chunks of his last human meal come out in violent bursts.

He stays there until his stomach’s empty, until every last ounce of blood he stole from Lisa leaves his body. As if that could reverse what he’s done and bring Lisa back to life.

But it can’t, of course. It’s done, he murdered her.

His transformation is complete; he’s a monster.

And as he finally wipes his mouth and gets up, the agonizing realization knocks him back down to his knees.

Lisa’s dead.

She’s dead.

He’ll never get to come home to her. He’ll never get to see her smile or the wrinkle in her brow when she’s angry at him. He’ll never get to bury his nose in her hair as they fall asleep, never hear her sing along to the radio as she irons clothes, her hips swaying to the rhythm.

He’ll have to go on, in a world without her, even if it’s just for another hour, another night.

He’d give everything to bring her back. He hasn’t even had the time to begin to miss her, but he’d give everything for another day with her.

And, oh God, maybe he can.

Maybe there’s still a way to fix everything. More impossible things have happened.

With his back pressed against the Impala, sitting on the cold, cold ground, Dean folds his palms in a prayer, his eyes lifted desperately to the High Heavens.

“Cas, you hear me? I fucked up big time, I—I need you to bring Lisa back. Please. I’ll do anything, just come down here and bring her back.”

He prays and he prays until his voice goes hoarse from crying, until his tears dry up, until all the words wash into a whispered litany of  _ bring her back bring her back bring her back _ .

But as Dean finally manages to get himself together, Lisa’s still as dead as she was.

And Cas never comes.


	2. Chapter 2

The motel room is dark and empty when Dean arrives. Sam must be looking for him around town, with Samuel.

Have they heard yet? Would they? News don’t travel that fast, not across the state lines. Not when it’s just another murder, another domestic violence crime. It’ll take a confused coroner to figure out the fang marks on her neck, a few days mor and the news will hit the press—she’ll be a sensation, a freakish, senseless murder with the culprit on the run. A local urban legend in the making.

And the duo will only start looking for Dean that far when they run out of options.

And their only option is here, waiting for them. In the dark, in the relative quiet of the busy street outside. In the fiery storm of his own thoughts.

That chaos in his head is what keeps Dean from hearing the two sets of heavy boots climbing up the staircase and two voices talking about something important. It doesn’t matter. He knows that they could only be talking about him. And soon the door opens and Samuel walks in, Sam right behind him.

“Can’t keep track of your brother now?” Samuel says, voice sharp on the side of annoyed.

Sam tries to excuse himself, and fails. “Well, I didn’t think he’d just—”

“He’s not himself, Sam. He’s a monster and he’s hungry. You gotta be prepared to do the right thing.”

Dean can’t blame Sam for his own decisions, for pulling the world’s oldest trick on him. Still, there’s a part of Dean that thinks, maybe if Sam kept a better watch, if he made Dean stay—

No. It was Dean’s action and his alone. And it wasn’t the hunger that made him sneak out. It wasn’t the monster inside him.

That came much later.

It was the human, the lover part of him. The family man trying to do the right thing and being too selfish about it.

Dean leans against the cabinet, takes a deep breath, trying to rid his voice of shaking.

“I told you he’d kill me when he showed up,” he says, emotionless.

Like on cue, Sam and Samuel pull out their machetes, ready to strike. Ready for defense. As if Dean came here for a little family dinner.

“Did you feed?” Samuel asks unceremoniously.

Feed. Yeah, doesn’t that sound nice, clinical almost.

“I went to say—” No, he can’t say her name. He can’t tell them what he did. He doesn’t want their judgement or their pity. “Went to get some fresh air.”

“Dean, answer the question,” Samuel says, more forcibly this time. As if he already knew.

“What if I did?” Dean barks.

The question is, rather, what if he didn’t. What difference would that make? Would Samuel hide the machete and spare Dean’s precious, vampire life? Would he let him go, just to hunt him down later, after Dean’s first, unavoidable kill?

Samuel’s face falls. Something deep, painful crawls out on it.

“It would mean we can’t—” he begins, but cuts himself off in time. No, not in time—too late. He already said too much and he knows it. He knows Dean’s curiosity will get it out of him. He still tries to put the topic back on its right rails. “Did you?”

Dean narrows his eyes at him.

“Can’t what?” Samuel doesn’t answer. There’s something he knows—that they both know—that Dean’s not sure he wants to find out. But he can’t let that go. “Can’t what?!” he bellows.

The tips of both machetes lift up towards him. Oh, come on.

“Can’t cure you,” Sam supplies, quietly.

Dean takes a moment to process his words. He surely must have heard that wrong.

He closes his eyes.

“Cure me?” he echoes. There is no cure for vampirism. There just isn’t, never was, never will be. They’ve been in it for long enough to know that. “You can’t cure a vampire.”

“Not if the vamp fed,” Samuel says. “But until then—” He might as well leave it hanging right there. All three of them know it’s too late. But the look on Dean’s face prompts him to go on. “There’s an old Campbell recipe, been in the family for generations.”

A cure. He could have been cured.

What a huge fucking punch in the gut that is. If only he knew about the cure just a few hours earlier, if he knew before— He would have never left this goddamn motel room. He would have never had to say goodbye.

Lisa would still be alive.

Everything would be just fine.

If he only knew...

His eyes flick to Sam’s. Cold shiver surges up his spine at the very thought.

“Did you know about this, Sam?”

“No!” Sam’s eyes grow wide, head shaking rapidly, like he’s trying a little too hard. “No! Of course I didn’t. I would have told you right away. We just talked about it on the way here.”

Dean’s just gonna pretend he didn’t catch the weird look Samuel sent Sam’s way for that. ‘Cause if he doesn’t pretend—Dean really doesn’t have the headspace right now to try and unpack the implications.

He’ll be fine if he just dies pretending.

“Well.” Dean licks his lips. He doesn’t look either of them in the eye when he says those two damning words. “Tough luck.”

At least he doesn’t have to spell it out for them.

“Goddammit, son.” Samuel drops to the nearest chair, the machete loose in his hand.

They don’t find Dean all that threatening anymore, with blood in his stomach (and not on the side of the road.) Not now, maybe not for a day or two. Not now that he’s no longer riding high on his baby vamp bloodlust.

Not now that he’s beyond saving.

Sam drops his weapon too, but not his stare. There’s no sympathy in it, as if he had forgotten to turn the switch on. There’s accusation there, instead.

“Who?” he asks. “Who did you feed on?”

_ Lisa, Lisa, Lisa, _ the word echoes in Dean’s head. His jaw tenses. No. They’re not gonna hear it, not from him. He’s too much of a coward, he’s too ashamed to ever admit to Sam what he did, and not when he’s looking at him like this. Even if Dean wanted to, the words wouldn’t make it past his clenched throat.

They’re gonna have to learn about it from the news.

“Doesn’t matter.”

But it does. Sam takes a step forward, his nose flares. The machete sways in his grip.

“Who was it?” he repeats.

Dean shakes his head, spills out the first lie that sprouts on his tongue, “Some rapey dude who dragged a drunk girl into a dark alley.”

Because that makes killing someone okay…

He hopes he managed to put enough confidence into his words to convince Sam. And that this bullshit of an excuse is good enough for him.

It works. Sam loosens up.

While Dean still stands tall, head high, his neck bared.

“Alright.” He swallows hard. “Let’s just get this over with.”

Maybe he should have given them something less digestible. That he drank the drunk girl, instead. That he drank a working mom of five. That he bled a prom queen dry.

Maybe then they wouldn’t have forgotten that they were here to end his fucking life, not to have a tea party.

“I’m waiting,” he reminds them.

“It’s alright, Dean,” Sam says half-heartedly. “We don’t have to do it right now.”

He’s gotta be fucking kidding him.

The only thing that has kept Dean functioning throughout this whole pointless conversation is the promise of death. While every passing second he’s at risk of falling apart.

“Oh, did we have plans I forgot about? Should we go to a VIP screening of Twilight, first?”

Sam doesn’t even bat an eye.

“We suspect that the vamps are running some sort of skeevy operation, but we don’t know what it is.”

It takes Dean a beat to understand why Sam’s even telling him about it. Hunting, vampires, this whole godforsaken world—that’s none of Dean’s concern anymore.

Except it is. Because Sam says so. Because Sam’s watched too many spy movies and he’s dreamed up having his own man on the inside.

Dean almost laughs—or he would if he had a single funny bone left in his body.

“So, just to make sure I got this right. You’re asking me to—to what, exactly? Go into the nest and get the info? As if nothing happened?” And asking is putting it nicely. They’re demanding him to, if he wants to get the main prize of an ax to his head. They’re making him power through that stupid, unimportant thing on the worst day of his life. “Like it’s still just Dean and Sammy against the world?”

But he doesn’t get a vote, does he? They’ll keep nagging, twisting their words, until he says yes and believes that’s what he wanted all along. To do his last good deed before the lights go out. That’s the life of a hunter for you.

And so, through his clenched teeth, he agrees, goes for the door right away. Just to get it over with as soon as he can. And maybe, just maybe, to have something to take his mind off what he’s done, if only for an hour. Until he, at last, deserves his punishment.

“They’re building an army. And they’re being lead by someone from above. They’re doing something in Aurora, Illinois,” Dean relies all he’s learned, dryly. The sooner that’s done, the better. “I don’t know why or what they’re planning, that’s for you to figure out. Have fun.”

He should have just let the vamps end him. As soon as they figured out who he was, if only his machete happened to fall into the hands of one of them, it would all be over by now.

But that’s not Dean. He doesn’t drop in the middle of the mission if he can help it. He still had to give this stupid report so that Sam and Samuel can go on saving the world.

He’d hate to give the vamps the satisfaction anyway.

And they had a deal, didn’t they? All he had to do was return. And it would all be over.

And now? Now is the time. He won’t stand it another minute longer.

“Let’s do it,” he says, once he’s passed on every bit of info he got.

Samuel nods and pulls out the machete.

Dean puts his hands behind his back, fist wrapped tight around his wrist. He can’t give in to the instinct—vampire’s, hunter’s, doesn’t matter—he can’t strike back in defense. He can’t fight or dodge. Can’t even budge as the blade goes through his spine.

He lifts his chin up, leaving his neck bared and vulnerable.

His eyes land on his little brother. His little brother, who shouldn’t have to watch him die again. Not like this. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

What happened to going down swinging?

This doesn’t really count, does it?

“Sam, leave. You don’t have to see this.”

But Sam doesn’t move, as if he didn’t dare to disturb the tension that arose in the room.

“No,” he says.

Of course, stubborn son of a bitch. He might think he’s strong enough for it. He might be strong enough for it.

But it’s Dean who doesn’t want Sam to see him this way. He doesn’t want Sam to watch his head roll onto the floor, the rest of his body following. To be the one to wrap his parts into plastic and burn it on a funeral pyre in the nearest woods.

“Don’t make me drag you out myself.”

He can’t muster any softness, not even a small, supportive smile. Not with all this weight trying to smother him out. He’s managed to get this far, only by keeping his razor sharp focus on the task at hand. Get into the nest, get the info, slay every last vamp inside, slay fucking Boris who did this to him. Get out.

But pushing it to the back of his mind is not the same as forgetting. How could he forget for even a moment?

Even as he dies, Lisa’s pale, dead face will be the last thing he sees behind his eyelids.

“No,” Sam repeats, ignoring Dean’s words. “You don't have to do this, Dean.”

Dean really doesn't have the strength to do this.

“So you’re a vampire—so what?” Sam continues and Dean braces himself for some bullshit speech. “Doesn’t mean you’re not still you. We moved past the black and white, remember? Not all vampires are monsters.”

“Oh, I am a monster, alright?” Dean turns to Samuel. “Do it.”

But Sam puts his hand on Samuel's to stop him. The man looks at him nearly as annoyed by the hold up as Dean.

“Wait. Listen, Dean. This is an—an opportunity,” Sam continues. “You've got this strength now, you can use it. You can help people.”

Dean pinches the bridge of his nose. He really can’t do this right now.

“Save the spiel, Sam. This is it.”

“You’re a hunter, Dean! You don’t just walk away from that because—”

“I’m a vampire!” Dean snaps.

But before either of them can add anything more, Samuel puts his hand on Sam’s shoulder.

“Can I talk to you for a moment?”

Dean opens his mouth to protest. He really doesn’t like this whole stalling. It should have been done hours ago and he’s really growing impatient.

But he doesn’t say anything. He lets them leave the room, he listens to their steps until they stop.

Oh, they really should have kept walking. They shouldn’t have underestimated how good a vampire’s hearing is.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Samuel asks.

“There’s an army of vampires out there, Samuel. You heard him, they’re not afraid of us. And Dean—he’s a vamp now. Imagine this—” he pauses for impact, “—a spy.”

There’s silence. Whether a stunned one, not dissimilar to Dean’s shock at the moment, or a pondering one; remains to be seen. If Dean even decides to stick around this long.

He’s a hunter, not a freakin’ vampire James Bond. And this wasn’t the deal.

And then, somehow, it gets worse as Sam continues, his voice progressively more excited in the creepiest way possible.

“And think how much we could learn about vampires. What else do we not know about them? What other ways can we hurt them? Or cure them, who knows? Not long ago we didn't even know any cure existed.”

“You've known about the cure, Sam,” Samuel says without missing a beat. Thankfully, for now, at least, he ignores the rest of Sam’s villainous ideas.

And Sam… Sam doesn’t deny it.

“Not the point,” is all he says.

So much for Dean’s blissful ignorance.

Sam had known about the cure all along. He could have just told Dean. He could have prevented all of this with three little words. But he chose not to. And for what? Did he think Dean wouldn’t go to the nest if he knew about the cure?

Preposterous, because Sam knows Dean.

But he must have.

Because there’s no other explanation. There isn’t.

And if there is one, Dean doesn’t plan to find out, to listen to excuses. He’s not staying here another minute longer.

He quickly stuffs his things into his duffle bag, ears listening in for the steps. He doesn’t have much time, but he also doesn’t have much to do. He has no goodbye note to leave.

Except—

He pulls out dad’s journal from his duffle bag. He’s not gonna need it where he’s going. Though, Sam probably won’t need it either, with all the secret knowledge he carries in his brain these days.

The entry on the vampires is hardly an entry at all. Just a few sentences they jotted down themselves, years ago. Chop the head off to kill, use dead man’s blood to incapacitate, to hurt. Apparently, there’s a whole lot more to be added.

Dean grabs a pen and adds his own quick observation before throwing his bag out the bathroom window and climbing through it, for the second time today.

_ Unknown facts about vampires: being a vampire sucks ass. _

There is nowhere for him to go. There is no place for him to stay, here. The only thing he knows is that he has to get out of this town, get as far from his brother and Samuel as he can.

So he does what he’s always done: he slips behind the Impala’s wheel, drops his bag on the passenger seat, and, without looking back, he drives.

It’s so much easier to focus on the road ahead. Now that he’s a big vampire boy, the lights are no longer so blinding, the roar of passing cars doesn’t make his head pound. Now that the rush is gone—though never the grief, never the hatred.

Now that he’s fed.

The streets of Limestone are busy even at this time of night, the endless traffic lights keep holding him back. At every turn, his eyes dart up to the rearview mirror, making sure Samuel’s GMC hasn’t caught up to him.

He’s in luck, in this miniscule way, at least.

Soon, he’s out of the town, out of the county, out of the state. He drives until he’s put long hours between here and then. Still, entire centuries could pass, he knows; it would never hurt any less.

How can Sam want him to keep on living like this?

Not just a vampire.

A murderer.

A monster.

When every living second is like living in hell, every heartbeat more agonizing than the entire menu of Alastair’s torments.

No, even before Lisa’s blood touched his lips, living on was never the plan.

He stops on the side of the road, not too long ‘til sunrise: in the east, the sky’s already turning gray. Never as in this moment has he wished for all those vampire stories to hold the truth in them. That the pale morning light was all that he’d need—to stand tall where he’s standing, to lift up his face to the sun for the last time and burn and burn until the wind scatters his ashes along the road.

But he’s not Tom Cruise, and this is the real world, and in the real world there is only one way for his kind to go out. And he couldn’t possibly do it alone. Not without a fucking guillotine.

So he closes his eyes, hangs his head in prayer. He’s got nothing to lose.

“Come on, Cas. I know you’re busy, but I really, really need you.”

He doesn’t expect Cas to come. He didn’t before, when Dean cried and begged. Why would he come now, when Dean’s filled with a different type of desperation? A dark, repulsive type, spreading out warning signs—don’t come close, you won’t like what you’ll hear.

Yet, Cas comes. A rustle of his wings cuts the silent air behind Dean.

“Who are you?” he asks, anger building in his voice from the get-go. “What have you done to—”

He cuts off as Dean turns to face him. His face changes as it begins to dawn on him; Dean’s body, Dean’s corrupted soul—the discordance of it.

“You can’t be—”

His wide eyes snap away, to the stretch of the asphalt behind Dean, to Cas’s hands, up to heaven—only ever landing on Dean for long enough to make sure they’re not failing him. Make sure this  _ is _ Dean and not some trick of light. Then they wander away again.

Is Dean so ugly, now? Is his soul so abhorrent Cas can’t even stand to look at him?

“Aw, you noticed the new shirt? How nice of you!” The mockery comes out of Dean’s mouth before he can stop himself.

It’s always the jokes with him, isn’t it? How else could he bear to stand there, stripped to the abomination of his soul, loathsome to the man who once gazed at him like he was some fucking miracle?

“Dean? Tell me this isn’t real.”

“Oh, I’d love to,” Dean says, but instead of coddling Cas, he shows off his brand new set of shiny fangs, in case a look at whatever his soul became still wasn’t enough for Cas to believe. He hopes his fangs aren’t still stained red. “But it’s real, alright.”

When the initial shock washes away, it leaves Cas in a pain that twists his face into a miserable mask. Now it’s Dean who looks away. He turns his back to Cas to sit on the hood of the Impala. A part of him hopes Cas will join him, but the guy gets only close enough to see his face when they speak.

“How did this happen?”

Dean shrugs. “A hunt gone awry, how else?”

He’s not gonna dwell on the details. On how Sam fucked him over, on how defenseless he was in the vampire’s grasp as Sam—

No. He couldn’t.

Dean pushes down the nasty thought. Ignorance is better, still.

“I’m sorry, Dean, I—I don’t know how to fix this.” After a beat, he adds, “But I’ll find a way.”

“I’m not looking for fixing.”

Cas cocks his head. “What do you mean you don’t?”

Dean bites his lip. It’s not an easy thing to ask of someone. It’s not some frilly favor. Even for Cas, especially for Cas. Even with his regained power and his restored dick-ish outlook on life, Cas is still a long way from his old ‘drag you back to hell’ attitude.

He’s a friend. And friends don’t ask friends this kind of favors.

Not in the orange glow of a sunrise, not this out of the blue. Maybe Dean should have planned it better, work Cas up to it. Maybe he should have scripted the whole speech.

But then, there isn’t any easier way to say it, so he has to just say it.

“I need you to kill me, Cas.”

“Let’s not be rash,” Cas says without pause. More irked than shocked, as if he thought Dean’s only overreacting. “I told you, I’ll find—”

“There is a way,” Dean cuts him off. “Or rather there was. A cure. But not for me. Not anymore. I fed, Cas. Game over.”

“There is a cure?” Cas repeats. If he knew about it, at least he’s a much better actor than Sam. “Then there’s gonna be another cure,” he says, so pragmatically.

“There won’t be.” Dean throws his hands up. This isn’t a freakin’ science fair. “Or there will be. I don’t care! I killed—”

“It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t control the bloodlust—”

“Bullshit!” Dean snaps, jumping off the hood. His voice is too loud in the silence of the empty road.

He won’t listen to any more excuses, any more of this same old song. It was his fault, not the disease, not the animal inside him, or whatever Cas will call it. He can’t stand it. He knows what he’s done, and if Cas is here, if he could hear him—if he could hear him all along…then there is no undoing that, is there?

“I can’t kill you, Dean.”

“Well, tough, Cas. You’re the only person I can ask. I can’t live like this. I can’t! It’s not about the fangs. It was Lisa, Cas. The love of m—” his voice breaks, at last. He takes a deep breath, trying to ignore the tears gathering at the back of his throat. “And Ben, he saw it. He tried to stop me. But I couldn’t. I—I just couldn’t—”

Dean buries his face in his hands, his breathing shaky. Cas comes closer, his hand lands on Dean’s shoulder. And Dean looks up at him, hopeful. All it takes is a touch, Cas’s palm splayed on his forehead and Dean’ll burn out whole and disappear into that good night.

There’s sympathy painted on Cas’s face. But the sympathy is all Dean can count on.

No mercy.

Instead, Cas changes the topic. “Do you have any idea what happens to monsters’ souls when they die?”

Dean sighs. He can tell it’s a lost cause. “They go to Disneyland?”

“To Purgatory.”

Purgatory. Right, makes sense, Dean supposes.

“Sounds good, whatever. Anything other than—”

“It’s adjacent to Hell,” Cas continues. “How pleasant of a place do you think it is? You expect to free yourself of guilt there? You’re only going to spend eternity wallowing in it.”

“And that’s worse than being alive…how? At least there I won’t hurt anyone else.”

Cas must know that Dean is right. He must know that killing him is the only choice here. Still, he grasps at whatever arguments he can find.

“Here you’ll have a chance for redemption.”

Dean lets out a humorless laugh. Redemption. There’s no redemption for this. But, of course, he should have expected Cas to give him the same kind of shit Sam did.

Why did he ever think that Castiel, the ‘nuke an entire town for a single demon’ kind of angel, the ‘torture a literal child for info’ guy, would show Dean this bit of mercy.

No matter if Dean falls to his knees, begging, or bursts out crying.

“Please, Cas,” he still tries.

“You can’t ask this of me, Dean.”

“I know it’s a lot. I know I’m not asking for a pony. But if I mean anything to you, I’m begging you, Cas. Kill me. Quickly.”

There’s so much pain in Cas’s eyes, in the quiver of his lips. But there’s no struggle behind it. He’s not even contemplating it.

Cas is not gonna kill him.

“Just ask me anything else and I’ll do it. But not this.”

Dean’s jaw tenses, head hung low. Anything…

“Bring her back,” Dean demands.

Cas lets out a heavy sigh. Of course.

“I knew you couldn’t,” Dean says. “Because I’m sure you wouldn’t let me cry my fucking heart out, wouldn’t let me crawl and beg for you to do it and then come here without her, right? ‘Cause you did hear me, didn’t you?”

“I heard you.”

“Well, then, where is she?”

“It’s not that simple—”

Dean snorts. “Of course. ‘Cause why would an angel who brought me back to life, who brought Bobby back to life like it was nothing— But you didn’t know Lisa, so you don’t care.”

He aims to hurt. At least that he’s still good for. Maybe in spite, Cas will act. Maybe in anger, in his old, angelic, righteous wrath, Cas will see—truly see—the monster that’s left where Dean used to be.

But Cas remains unruffled. “Do I need to remind you that I had to literally go to Hell to retrieve your soul?”

Dean’s heart skips a beat. “Lisa’s not in Hell!” It comes out louder than he planned.

“It would be easier if she was, believe me. Because in Heaven, there’s Raphael. He  _ rules _ Heaven now. You remember Raphael, the archangel, right?”

“So you’re just useless,” Dean spits. “Won’t kill me. Won’t bring Lisa back. Can you at least tell me what the hell I am supposed to do now? Or did Raphael forbid you that, too?”

“Dean…”

“Don’t  _ Dean _ me!” Dean turns away. For him, this conversation’s over. “If you’re not gonna help, you can go. Just go!”

Cas doesn’t move. He stands right behind him like some fucking menacing shadow sans anything useful to offer. At least, he can’t stop Dean from leaving, either.

“What are you gonna do, Dean?”

One thing Dean’s learned is that he can’t ask family, he can’t ask friends to do this. And maybe it was simply unfair of him to try. He should never have asked what his dad once asked of him—he could never forget the weight of that command on his shoulders.

After all, there are other options.

He’s a monster now—and there’s an entire network out there, of people whose life goal is to get rid of his kind.

“If you can’t help me, I’ll find someone who can.”

The tip of the plastic straw pierces through the bag like it’s fucking Capri Sun. The blood inside it is thick and cold. The temperature—how unnatural it is, how akin to dead—makes Dean’s first, involuntary reaction to recoil and spit it out. Even after weeks of drinking it, he hardly manages to keep it on his tongue and swallow.

Hell of a survival instinct right there—wouldn’t want to sip a little dead man’s blood by accident, would he? Hot blood, straight from the vein, that’s the stuff. Except in Dean’s case, only the stuff from nightmares—those plaguing him every night.

It gets better after the first taste. He drinks the blood as fast as his stomach lets him, struggling against the desire to savor every drop. It’ll be a while ‘til he gets to have another bag.

No, no it won’t be.

This is his last bag of blood; his last meal. Tonight, everything’s gonna go according to plan, at last.

It has to.

He’s been alive like this for too long already. He’s had too many chances to kill, to hurt. Too many times he has hurt. No matter how much he tells himself that he’s not drinking people, only drinking donated blood—with each bag, each transaction in a shady alley, he harms those who need the blood desperately: the sick, the injured, the most vulnerable.

He needs it too. That’s what he tells himself. Not to survive, ‘cause God knows it’s the last thing he wants. He needs blood to satiate the bloodlust, he needs blood to kill every urge. He needs blood to walk among the living, breathing, blood-pumping people.

So he made it a routine. Every night that he goes out to town, on a new kind of hunt, he opens the portable fridge—the permanent fixture on the Impala’s passenger seat—pulls out a blood bag and downs it like a frat boy chugs beer straight from the keg.

A new kind of hunt. The irony is not the right word for it; it’s fitting. Now that he is a monster, he no longer hunts monsters. He hunts the hunters instead.

Not in the murderous way, of course. No matter what it looks like from the sidelines.

No, he’s being perfectly polite, isn’t he? Cornering the tired, half-drunk hunters in dark alleys, dropping his machete on the ground between him and them and showing them his pretty, pretty fangs. He doesn’t move past that—doesn’t move at all.

He waits.

The same way he waited for Samuel’s move, head held high, neck bare, hands behind his back.

But as soon as he lets the light fall on his face and the hunters’ eyes recognize him like he’s freakin’ Angelina Jolie, his name slips from their mouths—he didn’t take long to learn that, at that point, the game is over. They won’t kill him. They won’t even pick the fucking machete.

They leave, just like that. Abandon a perfectly good hunt, turn their back on him as if he’s a dirty beggar, not a killing machine.

Because Dean’s apparently Cain these days. Even without the mark God’s too absent to brand him with.

Tonight will be different.

Tonight, Dean’s got a different plan.

And he doesn’t like it one bit.

“Hey, babe, great news: Ben made it into the team!”

Dean presses his head against the cold brick wall as the sweet melody of Lisa’s voice flows out of the speaker. By now, he knows every word of this last, little message she left on his voicemail what now feels like a lifetime ago. He knows the exact rhythm of the sentences, the cadence coloring each syllable.

He could replay it in his head, over and over, the perfect facsimile of her excitement and pride, of the joy of sharing the moment with the man she loved. He could. He has.

But it would never be the same as hearing it. It would never be the same kind of torture, wouldn’t break his heart so well, each night.

“You better get your butt over here for a blow-by-blow of his first training.”

Time and time again he held the SIM card between his fingers, just a little pressure to make it snap, but he could never get himself to do it. Even though it gave Sam a chance of tracking him down. Even as each time it takes more voicemails to dig through. Those from Sam stopped a while ago, once he found out the truth. Those from Bobby, though, they keep on coming. They keep on hurting.

“Can’t wait to see you. I—”

Dean shuts Lisa’s message before it gets to the end. He doesn’t deserve to hear her  _ I love you. _ Doesn’t deserve to whisper it back to no one.

Before he gets to hesitate and change his mind again, he disassembles the phone and with one, quick, painful pinch, he snaps the card in half. Just like that, it’s gone. The last remaining echo of Lisa Dean broke, just like he broke her.

He throws all the pieces of plastic into the dumpster, trying not to puke at the stench. Oh God, the stench. He really could have chosen a nicer scenery. But this is what he deserves, to end this miserable existence behind a dumpster, in some piss alley of some fuck-knows-where town.

Slamming the cover shut doesn’t help much with the stink, but it offers a place in the spotlight for the sharp blade of his favorite machete. He’s not leaving the choice of weapon to chance.

He’s not leaving anything to chance, tonight.

No one’s gonna see his face this time, in the darkness of the alley. The nearest working streetlamp shines at the end of the block. The weak glow of the rising moon can only do so much to draw out the shapes from the impenetrable to the human eye shadow.

All they’re gonna see are his fangs.

Dean pulls the black hood on his head, for good measure, and waits, still, in that shadow, like the Prince of the Night that he is. It doesn’t take long until the bar door opens and, for a moment, the drunken clamor pours out into the quiet of the night. Then only two voices remain, a hushed chatter of the newly familiar voices, talking about the freshly slain ghoul.

He’s been keeping an eye on the hunters since they got into town earlier today. Now, they don’t make it the five hundred feet to their Subaru, not without a detour.

“Evening, gentlemen,” Dean hisses through his fangs, and, before either of them turns, he snatches the nearest one and drags him into the dark like a rag doll. “Hunt any vamps tonight yet?”

The other guy stares at where his friend disappeared to, too stunned to move, to reach into his duffel. Or maybe it’s not the surprise, but something else. It gives Dean the queasiest sense of deja vu. But he isn’t gonna stop. Dean’s not going easy on them, not tonight. They’re gonna have to fight back eventually.

But for now, the guy Dean’s got in his play-pretend chokehold, puts up no resistance, as Dean pulls him behind the dumpster and smacks him against the brick wall.

“Dinner  _ and _ depleting your kind in one?” Dean teases theatrically. God, this is so embarrassing. How do the bad guys keep it up for real? “That’s a steal if I've ever seen one.”

But the hunter’s not scared. Not in the slightest.

“That all you got? Dumb talk?” He gives Dean a lopsided smirk. “I expected more from a Winchester.”

This is fucking impossible. He couldn’t have recognized Dean. Not here, not with the precautions. Dean’s never even seen the guy in his life, so he couldn’t have known Dean either, or his voice or whatever the fuck else gave Dean away.

“How?” Dean demands, retracting his fangs.

“Oh, everyone knows about you”—the guy pauses, let the next words sink in better—“and what you did to your woman.”

Dean strikes. In the surge of anger, he drives his fist into the wall. Close enough to the guy’s head to have him flinching away. A broken brick crumbles, pieces falling to the ground.

“Do your job!”

“You’re not gonna kill me.”

“Try me!”

Dean yanks the guy by his jacket and slams him, face-forward, against the dumpster, the metal reverberating, the old, rusted wheels squeak but they don’t budge. The machete’s right in front of the guy’s eyes, right in his hand’s reach. All he’s gotta do is take it and do what he does any given Sunday.

Dean gets closer, his chest nearly pressed against the man’s back. He traps him between himself and the dumpster, one fist wrapped around his collar.

“I murdered the love of my life,” he whispers, lowering his head to the man’s neck. “What makes you think I’ll spare you?”

The raised thumping of a heartbeat fills Dean’s ears, blocks out everything else.

Though he’s practically dumpster diving, there’s no other smell on his mind than of the blood pulsating just underneath the hunter’s skin.

Not the prepackaged, frozen goo—fresh, hot, living blood.

It’s inebriating, it’s powerful; it grabs Dean by his throat, makes him salivate like a fucking dog—

No.

No, Dean’s the one in control. He’s in control. He’s got his stomach full of blood, hunger subdued, desire tamed. He’s got this.

He can do this.

“You’re bluffing!” the hunter gasps.

He’s bluffing. Of course, he’s bluffing when his lips hover a hairbreadth away from the hunter’s neck. Just a tiny pinch away from the ambrosia inside his veins.

What could a little taste hurt?

The fangs shoot out from Dean’s jaws like they’ve a mind of their own. Their very tips graze the hunter’s skin before Dean can snap his head back. Barely pinpricks, but that’s enough to draw blood. That’s enough to make Dean lose his senses.

No.

He’s in control. He’s in control. He’s been doing so good.

It’s a struggle—pulling away, but he pulls away before it’s too late.

“Am I bluffing?” Dean asks, breathing ragged.

With a heavy hand, he snatches the machete. He’s gonna force it into the hunter’s grip if he has to.

A cock of a gun.

“Hey, asshole!” comes from the right side.

There comes a familiar bang, a familiar strike. A familiar pain and Dean’s body rams into the wall.

The hunter slips away as soon as he gets a chance, while Dean flails around for something to hold on to, something to stop the fall.

The machete clinks against the pavement.

“Finish it,” Dean says, cradling his wounded shoulder. He can barely force himself to look the two towering men in the eye. “Please.”

They just shake their heads. Not in decline; in pity.

“I’m sorry, man,” says the one with the gun, while the other wipes a trail of blood off his neck. “You were one of the good ones.”

He kicks the machete away and, just like that, the hunters leave Dean, hurt but far from dying, alone in this fucking fetid alley.

“What the hell is wrong with all of you?!” Dean shouts, but no answer comes.

Dean returns heaving to his car, the adrenaline still buzzing in his poisonous veins, his vampire blood still pouring out of the wound. It hurts, it fucking hurts, as gunshot wounds tend to do. And the bullet’s still stuck inside, of course. In the back of his shoulder, a few inches off-center. If only the hunter aimed a little better, if the bullet went through the spine… Dean’s got no certainty that it would do the job, but maybe the blast would be enough to leave him for dead.

As is, all it did was hurt and immobilize his left arm.

But it’ll pass soon. All he needs is more blood. And more and more.

He sinks into the driver’s seat, not even caring that he’s bleeding all over the upholstery. Baby’s seen worse. He reaches to his cooler and pulls out a full blood bag. He weighs it in his hand, squeezes a little, watches the fluid flop from side to side. This is all he needs for his wound to close. Maybe the bullet will even come out on its own and spare him work and pain.

Just a few sips and he’ll be like new.

No. No, that wasn’t the deal. He set one rule: only drink when it’s absolutely necessary. When he has to go among people, be docile and harmless and unarmed.

Yet, tonight, he wasn’t any of those things, even fed. How the fuck did that happen? How much blood does he have to devour to keep himself tamed?

Anyway, this? This isn’t it. It’s not a necessity. The wound will heal one way or another, it’ll only take longer on its own.

He can’t be rewarding himself like this. He can’t be giving himself some extra snacks for such a glorious fuck up like he’s Scooby-Doo. A little pain never hurt nobody. This pain will do him good, will teach him to behave better next time.

He drops the bag back into the cooler and shuts the lid.

He’s gonna do it the old-fashioned way, the human way. He’s never been a stranger to wounds, to pain, to waiting. He’s gonna be fine, of course.

Biting down on his lip, Dean stomps on the gas and drives ahead. One arm out of commission makes it harder to meander through the back alleys, but he manages and he’s soon out of the town.

He’s heard about a place, nearby, a few years back. An abandoned farmhouse turned into a safehouse for whichever hunter needed it at the time. After the fire, not even the hunters use it anymore. Sounds like a good place to mend himself and rest a little. No matter the condition, as long as it still stands.

And it stands; its walls do, at least. That’s enough.

It sits in the middle of a huge ranch; the outgrown bushes and weeds covering the land should successfully deter any stray wanderer. What must have one day been a driveway hasn’t been used in years.

It looks worse on the inside than it does on the outside. The eastern side of the house has been burned to a crisp. The fire must have started in one of the bedrooms and spread from there.

It spared the kitchen for the most part, though, and that’s where Dean sets up his medical station. He tears off the melted remains of the oilcloth, leaving the stone countertop bare. He lines it with his first aid kit and his collection of ‘surgical’ tools.

Dean peels off the bloody shirt that stuck to the wound. It doesn’t look terrible; the caliber wasn’t big and, thank fuck, it wasn’t a shotgun.

Still, the useless asshole just had to shoot him from behind. Dean’s not exactly the bendiest type, especially not with torn muscles and the bullet blocking his movements. But it’s high enough for him to reach and poke around until the bullet comes out.

Shit, this is gonna suck.

He’s no freakin’ Rambo, alright? And he usually deals with ghosts, not cowboys.

Sure, it’s not the first time he got a taste of lead. But then, he had Sam to pull the bullet out of him and stitch him up.

Now all he’s got is himself, the pliers, and a wooden knife handle between his teeth. Secured on a sturdy, metal chair, he twists his body around, his good arm reaching back as far as he can. He could really use a second pair of eyes or a set of mirrors, but he’ll have to do with trial and error and the growing ache leading his hand.

The tip of the pliers drives into the ripped skin. Dean flinches and nearly drops the pliers, a curse escapes his lips.  _ Amazing start. _

He shifts his chair closer to the shelf, uses its edge to push his elbow deeper and secure it in its position. He leaves all maneuvering to his wrist and the tips of his fingers.

A few calming breaths and he tries again. The pliers hover over the wound and slowly, ever so slowly, Dean slides them inside.

He moves a millimeter at a time, his body tenser than he’d like, steeled for the inevitable.

And it comes. Time after time. The slightest brush of the tool against the bleeding muscle. The bolt of pain cuts through his entire body. Another curse, another deep breath. But he doesn’t back out this time. He holds his position and keeps going.

Every bit of the way is hard-won as he pushes past the torn tendons, past open nerves, past the bright red agony. Even as his fangs fill out his mouth, bore into the piece of wood. Even as the black flakes threaten to obscure his vision.

At last, there’s resistance as the tips of the pliers find the bullet. Dean opens the jaws ever so slowly until they’re wide enough to grab it. Then he proceeds to force them in, between the sides of the bullet and the walls around the open wound.

There’s no reprieve this time, only pain, as the metal drags along the raw meat. He goes as far as his shaking hand will let him, and when he can’t take it anymore, he pinches the pliers hard, wishing he could get a better hold on the tool. But this is what he gets and he’s gonna have to risk it. If the bullet nested itself in the bone, he’s screwed.

He’s lucki, though. When he pulls, the bullet moves right with him. He barely stops himself from yanking it out all at once, just for it to be over.

A little bit more and it’s finally out. It drops to the tiled floor along with the pliers, as Dean loosens his palm. Thank fuck, it’s done. Wheezing from exhaustion, Dean spits out his impromptu fang-guard and slinks down to the pleasant, cold ground, relieved.

The worst game of Operation in his life.

He’s not risking that again, any time soon.

If he’s gonna risk it at all.

Going among people, hunting the hunters? How the hell did he think that was gonna end?

But this was not supposed to happen, his fangs were not supposed to spring out against his will. He was fed, he was perfectly sated, both in body and in mind. Yet, that somehow didn’t manage to stop the bloodlust. The very smell of fresh, warm and unfrozen blood turned him back to that vicious monster who murdered Lis.

The fangs apparently have a mind of their own. Vile little things. Maybe it’s not a matter of hunger, not always. It’s more animalistic than that. They’re there to feed his body, they’re there to protect it from harm.

Without them, even in a lustful frenzy, he wouldn’t be this dangerous. Without them, he wouldn’t have been able to bleed Lisa dry. Not unarmed.

Whether keeping them in control is just a matter of practice, Dean doesn’t know. And he’s not gonna stick around long enough to test it.

But until then…

The pliers lie right there, on the floor, in his arm’s reach. He scoops them up with his shaking fingers, he weighs them in his palm. All this torture that they put him through, the burning that still pulsates from his shoulders, down his back along with the trickling blood. All this pain.

It might take him a while to recover, just enough to gather himself off the floor.

But then, that’s what repentance is. Not just the swelling regret, not just the aimless self-loathing and wishful thinking. It’s acting, too. It’s reversing the damage done. Or, at the very least, preventing further harm.

It’s the punishment.

The suffering.

The pliers have a metallic tang. Dean’s own blood that coats them has a foul, bitter taste.

His fangs recoil and hide at the very touch.  _ Cowards. _

He left the cooler with his bag the door. Now he drags himself towards it across the floor. The rule said no bag of blood for him, unless it’s absolutely necessary; but it is absolutely necessary now.

There’s no guarantee it will work. His entire body despises the fridge-stored blood. Even as it desperately craves it. And it craves it, right now. Hurt and damaged and knowing it’s the best it can get.

So when he opens the bag, as soon as the scent of blood, even this blood, fills his nostrils, the fangs are there, again, as if expecting a vein they could sink into.

They’re met with cold disappointment. And with the strong grasp of the steel jaws.

Dean’s pinched the protruding tip of a front fang without a moment of hesitation. It puts up resistance, like a living, breathing thing, trying to escape, while the rest of the fangs slid right back into his gums.

He the blood bag aside to lock both of his fists around the handles. With a firm grip, he pulls at the fang, straight down, along his incisor. He’s moving slow, just to test it out. It takes some force but for the first few millimeters the fang comes out with little more than an uncomfortable tense sensation.

Dean’s, of course, not naive enough to hope it’ll be this easy, that his murderous friends will pop out of his jaws like kernels off the cob. But he’s prepared for what’s to come. Then the twinge of pain comes, he doesn’t let the pliers loosen their hold.

He slips the wooden knife handle between his teeth, again, to keep his tensing jaw open. Then he pulls, pulls down farther, despite the stinging in his mouth. It grows sharper and deeper, threatening to rip his gum apart, but Dean ignores it and keeps at it, until, with a reverberating grind, the wiggle room ends and the fang refuses to move past that. It’s blocked by the bone, or maybe by the roots of the human tooth beneath. This one Dean would prefer to keep, so he doesn’t try yanking.

With a tip of his finger, he feels the fang. It’s way beyond its natural position, attached to the jaw by a broken, bleeding tissue that throbs like an open wound. Now comes the hard part. Now comes ripping the roots from the bone. Clean, preferably. Without enamel shards and razor-sharp edges left to bite into the inside of his lip, left to fester and rot, baring the nerve for each slightest brush of air.

With small, forceful movements, Dean pushes the fang to the sides, to loosen it up in the jaw. It brings a different kind of ache; a tearing, crunching sensation that with each fraction of a degree that he gains, climbs up higher, wider up the bone structure of Dean’s face, like a fucking vice closing on his cheekbones, collapsing his eye sockets till his vision’s dimmed.

The muscles in his fingers are going numb, his grip barely holds but he can’t let it go now. He carefully readjusts his right hand on the handles, slippery from the blood, his blood he’s been trying to ignore as it poured onto his lap. With the other hand, he reaches out to the chair, the metal legs screech against the floor as he drags it closer.

The fucker nested itself in his jaw as if it’s always grown there, since his baby teeth. Slow and methodical isn’t gonna cut it. He needs something more drastic. He has to do it all at once.

Heaving, Dean climbs up to his knees, holding onto the chair for dear life. Cranking his neck, he locks the handles of the pliers securely between the metal grid of the seat.

He takes a deep, long breath. Slowly lets it out. Now or never.

With knuckles white against the cold metal, he jolts his body backward. The crack thunders down to his tailbone. His sight fails him, his body fails him, the force smacks him against the fridge and he slides to the ground. He might have fainted as well, just for a moment.

But it’s done. The pliers lie on the floor beneath the chair and right beside them, a long, pointy, glistening red fang. Or a part of it, at least.

Dean inspects his mouth with his tongue, his incisor tender and he can swear it’s moving under the touch. He slides the tip before his teeth, up to the horror scene left in his gum. The surge of pain makes him flinch.

Fuck.

One down, a shitton more to go.

This is gonna be a long, long night.


	3. Chapter 3

Dean puts the cooler, securely, in the trunk and shuts it close. This time, his stash isn’t going on the passenger seat. This  _ delicacy _ is waiting for the evening feast. For now, he’s got miles of drive ahead of him, back to the farmhouse. His resting place.

The afternoon sun hangs low over the horizon. Its rays filter through the heavy storm clouds. The rain hasn’t broken out yet. Driving west, he might still outrun it. Or maybe he’ll pick the longer route: there’s nothing wrong with enjoying his last day in the sun, the last trip in his Baby.

The Impala is the only thing he’s got no good plan for.

He used to.

He used to entertain a dream that he’d give her to Ben. He’d already started teaching him to take care of her. The kid was smart. He was grasping Dean’s lessons quickly. He would be good to her. And she’d be good to him. She was an old lady but there was still a lot of life in her.

Ben wouldn’t be a hunter, of course. Not in that dreamt up life. But he could still take her to road trips. Follow his favorite band on a tour or go across America with his friends. See the Grand Canyon for the first time…or maybe not the first—funny, Dean never asked him or Lisa if they’ve ever been there. Why is it so that, in Dean’s mind, the Grand Canyon only ever pops up when all has gone to hell?

She’s still a beauty, Ben could show her off at the school’s parking lot, pick up girls. She’d lend herself for a romantic night under the stars with Ben’s first love. She’d do well on a first date in a drive-in theatre too.

Ben’s first love—Dean will never get to see him experience it. Never give him his crappy advice. He curses himself for ever thinking he would. That he would be in Ben’s life for that long. That he’d be such an important part of his life.

He was no one, just a guy who moved in with them, randomly, one night. A burden through and through from the very beginning.

He drank most of that year with them away. He was a wreck.

Still, he managed to become a wrecker.

And now, even the Impala’s got nowhere to go. Sure, Dean could leave her somewhere for Sam to find, but Sam seems just fine driving whiny, plastic cars. And if Dean gets to be spiteful, for Sam’s role in Dean’s demise, for his silence, for his cold calculation, Dean gets to take something from Sam too.

So she’s gonna stay at the farm with him, for now, and then, she’s on her own. He can’t park her on the driveway, of course, not to draw attention, so as he returns, he drives the car straight into the barn. Standing far enough, it was never touched by the fire. Although, it must have survived more than one hurricane, judging by the missing parts of the roof. But it’ll do.

_ If you found her, she’s yours, the keys are in the glove compartment _ , Dean writes on a piece of paper and puts it on the windshield.

Hopefully, no one will find her until he’s long and proper dead. Just thinking about her driven by some strange, random person stings; foreign hands on her wheel, weird electronics stuffed here and there, douching her up.

But as long as they take good care of her, appreciate her as the classic car that she is, as she should be appreciated, she’ll be fine.

Dean leaves the keys, as promised, in the glove compartment. He’s disposed of all the firearms and most of the white weapons from the trunk.

He has left her for the last time so many times—on a parking lot, on the side of the road—as he left to confront hunter after hunter. He never meant to return to her, yet he never thought to kiss her goodbye then. So he does now, and somehow everything seems so much more final.

He’s about to leave, the cooler in his hand, when something comes to his mind. He pulls out the pen again and puts an addendum on the note.

_ Don’t go to the basement. _

The blood in the bags doesn’t look much different than the blood he’s carried around in the Impala for the last few weeks. It’s somewhat thicker, a little less fresh, if donated blood can even be called that. It’s just as cold. It’s red. It’s liquid. Even the plastic bags containing it are the same, bar for the four, big letters sharpied on it: DEAD.

Because it’s not food that he’s moving, one by one, from the cooler to his new mini fridge; it’s not life. It’s poison. It’s dead man’s blood bought off a morgue worker.

It was hard to estimate how much of the juice Dean’d need, so he went for too much rather than too little. Once he begins, there’ll be no going outside—there’s too much temptation out there for a starved animal. The seller was a little concerned with the order and took some time, but ultimately delivered.

Should be enough for a few months if he’s not too decadent with it.

Hopefully, he won’t need it to last months. But that’s a good question for Sam’s little study. Dean should probably be taking notes.

Dean managed to hook the fridge into the nearest electricity line without electrocuting himself. Now he sets it close to the shitty mattress in the corner. The center of his new little home, the way other people call fireplaces the heart of theirs. His won’t hold a family pyre in it. Though its contents will burn.

He picked the smaller chamber, away from the stairs and the, thoroughly locked and secured, door. The ceiling’s just high enough for him not to smash his head on it when he stands. The walls are just far enough apart not to feel claustrophobic. For now, at least.

The dirt on the windows sifts in just enough sunshine to let him see his pathetic surroundings without ever threatening to scorch his skin. Those molding walls and this peeling ceiling are gonna be the last thing he sees.

This shithole is gonna be his tomb.

Dean strips down to a t-shirt and jeans, folds the rest of the clothes on the wobbly table. Right next to a new kind of a first aid kit: a few packs of syringes and needles, and his trusty pliers. He didn’t take anything else there with him. No food or water, no edible blood. No personal possessions, no entertainment. All his phones he’s already thrown away.

He didn’t bring any pictures either; the one memory he’s got is enough for a lifetime.

There’s only him and dead man’s blood. And a death that can’t come soon enough.

Dean slips the needle into the bag, pulls back the plunger, watching the thick liquid fill the barrel. He covers the needle and sets the syringe down on the table, side by side with those he’s already filled and picks up an empty one. He’s slow and careful not to waste a single drop, not to spill it over his fingers. Not to have the stains of it linger on his skin, the stench, the taste.

There’s something calming about the process, the repetitive movements. About the detachment; he’s only focused on here and now, not on the pain that’s to come.

He keeps working, until three of the blood bags are empty. Should be enough for a couple of weeks. Hopefully, by then, he’ll be too weak to stay conscious on his own. Preferably, he’ll be dead, but Dean’s not holding his breath for that.

To keep them in his reach when he can’t get up anymore, he places the syringes on the lowest door shelf of the fridge. All of them but one.

Dean’s seen what it does to vampires. Incapacitation, loss of consciousness, for hours. Excruciating pain.

Just what the doctor ordered.

Sat down on the mattress, Dean outstretches his left arm. With ease, he finds a vein in the crook of his elbow. Slowly, he drives the needle into it.

He takes a deep breath and, without hesitation, he pushes the plunger all the way in.

Hardly does the poison come in contact with his blood, it turns into magma, burning, burning from the inside. The flames encompassing his hand, crawling up his veins. He can feel every inch of its travel straight to his heart.

And when it gets there, when the pump of his heart sends it out to the rest of Dean’s body, he can no longer hold back an agonized scream.

He screams, until his throat gets coarse and the only thought at the back of his mind tells him that maybe he’s dying.

It feels like dying.

But when he, at last, drops on his mattress in silence, he’s not dead. He’s merely sleeping.

The particles dance in the yellow sun that seeps in through the blinds as it pours over the pillows, pours over Dean’s eyelids. Its warmth kisses his skin, its nagging brightness stirs him awake. He doesn’t turn his face away. Though his eyes prickle, he still blinks them open against the light. He blinks until he can see anything besides it.

The thin fabric of the curtains, softly swaying in the breeze; the fresh coat of white paint on the ceiling; the pictures hanging on the wall. The pictures,  _ their pictures, _ his smiling face next to Lisa’s.

He’s home. He’s in the comfort of their bed, wrapped in the flowery scent of their freshly washed sheets. Wrapped in her arms, Lisa’s arms, as her head weighs on his shoulder. The locks of her black hair, sprawled on his bare chest, tickle his skin as she moves, only slightly. A soft noise slips out from her lips.

“Shhh,” he whispers to reassure her—he’s here. She can sleep on, there is nowhere they need to be.

She can sleep like this, in his embrace, forever. Her warm body pressed so close to his, the rise and fall of her chest dictating a soothing rhythm to his own breathing.

His eyelids become heavy, so he lets them fall. In the darkness, he can still feel her there.

He could sleep like this, forever.

He opens his eyes again and she’s gone. The home is gone, the peace. He’s back in his basement, the black mold crawling on the ceiling above him.

He’s awake. Wide awake, wishing that she’d opened her eyes too.

The revolt in his stomach yanks him up, drags him off the mattress. His knees hit the hard cement floor as he bends in half. With his palm covering his mouth, he sweeps the basement for the bucket, finds it by the door. Runs to it as fast as his legs let him, though it’s more of a crawl than a run.

But once he gets to the bucket and retches, nothing comes out but mucus and bile. His stomach is too empty. There’s nothing there but hunger. The ever-growing hunger.

And Dean knows hunger. Days of going without anything to put in his belly because the little they were left with had to be enough for Sammy. But it’s not the same, not by far. It’s not just his insides writhing in fury, it’s more. It’s like hot days on the desert with nothing around but dust, it’s shivering cold, all at once.

It’s feeling every inch of his body too sharply, too intensely. It’s the power growing in his muscles, instead of withering.

It’s his body telling him  _ hunt, hunt, hunt, bring food, kill, give me blood. _

_ You’re just an animal, after all _ .

How long has it been? The chill air on his skin and the ice painting in crystals on the windows tell him weeks. So do the piles of plastic bags by the mattress.

So do the sharp points of his fangs grown nearly past his teeth, but not quite yet. The chill freezes him to the bone at the phantom taste of metal in his mouth.

Something moves, in the corner of Dean’s eye. A tall silhouette of a person. His head snaps to the side, a little too sharply. But there’s nothing there.

And then there is. Something else. A different movement, nearby, shooting across the floor. Dean’s instincts kick in before he can think. Before he can even recognize the creature as a filthy little rat, he’s already got his mouth full of its fur, his human teeth biting into it, too dull, crushing its bones before breaking the skin.

At last, it’s broken and the blood fills his mouth. But it’s not the sweet taste of human blood. It’s not the revolting bagged blood. It’s worse. It tastes filthy and gross and he nearly spits it out but he still wants it, he still needs it, so he swallows down the reflux and keeps drinking, disgustingly, voraciously, until he’s drunk the very last drop of the rat’s blood.

It doesn’t sit well; heavy, uncomfortable. The bucket’s still there, in his arm’s reach, but he’s too greedy to puke it out. So he takes a few deep breaths of the musty air and keeps it down. He needs the nutrients, doesn’t he?

Except that wasn’t the point. Except he wasn’t supposed to use the nutrients and wasn’t supposed to feed. He was supposed to starve and fizzle out and die.

And now he has to start all over. And the hunger? It’s still there. Not as intense, not exactly painful. It’s been soothed by this little aperitif. But it’s still there. Waiting to grow back and make him break again. He can’t break again. He shouldn’t have broken this time either.

He’s gonna have to start over again and he’s pissed and he’s grossed out, and he thought he couldn’t hate himself more than he did that night. And yet.

How come he fails even at dying? How could he ever think he was strong enough to control himself among people?

“Great job, Winchester.”

He throws the dried out remains of the rat into the corner, the one nearest to his mattress. In case he needs a reminder.

He should have stuck up on chains.

The purr of the Impala rumbles sweetly around him as he turns the key in the ignition. A soft, soothing melody to his ears, so pampered, so fine-tuned. With his palms wrapped loosely around the wheel, he leans back in his seat, lets the vibrations relax his tired muscles.

He’s worked on her for a long time, he deserves this.

With his eyes half-closed, he watches the world behind the garage door. The green lawns of the neighboring houses, the sprinklers coming to life, casting rainbows in the sunlight.

Over the slopey rooftops, the sun descends in its journey. It goes from bright and blinding into a burst of subdued oranges and reds, it spreads its colors all across the horizon, as the gray sky above it chases it down.

At last, the sun gives in and sinks with all its colors, until even the gray turns to black and the whole world outside the garage door drowns in the darkness of the night.

Night. Is it already? He couldn’t have been here this long. He shouldn’t have.

He turns off the engine and jumps out of the car. He hurries to the door, stumbling on the tools cluttering the floor.

The mouth-watering aroma of roast pork seeps in through the crack over the threshold, but when he finally reaches the knob, the door won’t budge. He pats his pockets for the key, but it’s not there. He yanks the knob again, back and forth, rattling the door in their hinges, but it won’t let him in.

He runs out the garage door, into the darkness. He can’t see past the tip of his nose, he can’t see the path to the front door, so he picks a direction and walks. With his arms outstretched for security, he struggles not to slip on the wet ground, as the sprinklers rustle around him.

He walks and he walks, until his boots soak through, his teeth beginning to chatter. The path seems endless. Should he have gone the other way?

But then, as he almost loses hope, the bright-lit porch appears, floating in the blackness.

He runs the rest of the way, doesn’t stop until the soles of his boots land on the doormat. The melody of the bell resounds inside.

The door opens right away, Lisa appears in it. Her black locks cascading on her white dress, the remnants of laughter playing on her lips.

Behind her, the table’s fully made, with grease-smeared plates and wine-stained glasses. The white tablecloth is painted in red of the wax that dripped down the brass candlesticks and poured all over.

In the center of the table, a bare chest of ribs raises off the silver platter, every last bit of meat stripped off it.

“I’m sorry, I—I didn’t know it was so late,” Dean mumbles, apologetically. “You could have called me.”

“It’s okay, Dean.” A grin blooms on her lips, a little too wide. “We were doing just fine here, without you.”

“Oh.” He stumbles a step backwards, his chest tightens. Should he turn and leave, run straight into that cold, cold darkness? “Alright.”

“No, don’t worry, babe, I won’t let you starve,” Lisa coos, her hand reaching to Dean’s cheek. With the other hand, she tosses her hair back over her shoulder, revealing the wine stains marring the fabric of her dress and a growing bruise on the side of her neck. “I’ve saved you a little something.”

There’s a shadow in the corner that wasn’t there before, a curled up figure, the white half-covering its form shines near fluorescent in the surrounding darkness.

Dean blinks. No one can be here. He must be seeing things.

But the figure is still there, its black hair waving, gently, its shoulders quivering. She’s got her face buried in her hands, her knees pulled up to her chest.

How did she get here? How long has she been here? This is too dangerous, he could kill her.

No.

No, he couldn’t.

When she lifts her head revealing her face, he knows he couldn’t kill her.

He already did that.

“Lisa?”

He must be dreaming, still. Or hallucinating on the dead man’s blood that still burns inside his veins, his muscles, his brain.

Lisa can’t be here.

Her ghost’s not supposed to be here, either.

Fat tear drops roll down her beautiful, sickly pale face (as pale as when he left her, bloodless). Her eyes glare right at him.

“How could you do this to me, Dean?” she whispers, weakly.

Dean opens his mouth to answer, but no words come out. He can’t find any words. What could he tell her?

I’m sorry? I couldn’t control myself?

It wasn’t my fault?

What a lie.

Whose fault was it then? Her, for having all that intoxicatingly sweet blood pumping inside her? Her, for letting him into her life? Her, for loving him too much?

No, it was all entirely on him. He should have controlled it. He should have known better than to come to her home that night. Or to come to her, at all, a year ago. He never had the right to drag her into his life.

Now he knows the djinn attack was a sign, a warning. At least, he should have had a decency to end things there, let her go, keep her safe.

“How could you do this to me?” she repeats, louder now, the devastation turning into anger, as she rises to her feet. “To me, to Ben?”

Dean can’t do anything, can’t move. Still too weak from his daily, self-ordained ordeal. Or maybe it’s not the dead man’s blood. Maybe it’s her, standing tall above him, that renders him powerless. Maybe it’s the guilt that paralyses him.

It’s not like he could have it in him to hurt her any further than he already did. Even with salt, with iron at hand, even if her bones—her body—lain before him for burning.

He can only watch her. Watch her face twist in wrath, in hatred. So much hatred Dean didn’t think Lisa was capable of. His kind-hearted, gentle Lisa. (No, not his.) The way she looked at him now—

He deserved it.

He deserved every ounce of it. He deserved that face burned into his mind, never leaving him in any waking hour. She might be but a ghost now, a vengeful part of who she used to be. But the eyes that had welcomed him, bright and loving, each morning, they’ll have always looked at him like that now.

Like he’s the foulest, most vile creature crawling on this earth. Like everything he’s ever touched, he ruined. As he ruined her.

She inches closer, on her bare feet. Dean’s shaking palm feels blindly for a syringe beside his mattress. One shot and he can disappear from here. He can go back to the other kind of nightmares, ones he’s used to by now. But when his fingers find what they’re searching for, wrap around it, Dean doesn’t lift his hand up, doesn’t bring the needle to his vein.

He doesn’t get the easy way out. He has to let her say what she has to say. And everything she says, he needs to hear—every last word. He needs to etch them to his skin, so that he never forgets.

As if he could forget.

As if the questions, the pain, didn’t constantly echo against his skull and suffocate him when he tries to breathe. There is no escape for him.

In a blink, Lisa bends in half; her rage right in his face.

“How could you do this to me?!” Her voice echoes against the walls of his tomb.

He doesn’t cover his face, doesn’t close his eyes. He lets her force tear him down.

He deserves it.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he whimpers, tears rolling down his cheeks.

But that doesn’t mean anything.

It can’t bring her back to life. Make her move on, peacefully. It can’t fix a single thing.

She knows it too. She doesn’t listen. She disappears, leaving him alone as he chokes on his voiceless sobs.

He curls up into a fetal position. Every cell in his body hurts with guilt and loathing. His lungs scream for him to just end it, end it all. His body can’t stand it, his mind can’t stand existing.

A devastating scream rips from his throat, a scream no one’s gonna hear. And it doesn’t make it any better. Nothing can.

As he drives the needle into his arm, just to get any sort of reprieve, as the poison reaches his brain, in the last spark of consciousness, he knows that when he wakes again, she’s gonna be right there, waiting for him.

A distant shrill of children’s laughter, as bright as the sun above, fills the air. The oversaturated grass spreads wide, all the way to the line of young trees waving in the soothing wind.

On the other end of the park, by the old bleachers, Ben catches the flying soccer ball on his chest and lets it drop to the ground. With determination on his face, with his quick feet, he leads the ball away from the other team’s offense before passing it on to another kid.

Five seconds later, he’s waiting for the ball at the end of the pitch. As soon as he receives it, he strikes a winning shot, straight into the net.

With a victorious shout, Ben pumps his fist into the air.

“Did you see that?” Dean bellows to no one, lifting both his thumbs up when Ben spots him.

Although it’s just a friendly match, Dean can’t help the pride swelling in his chest. As if he’d spent every afternoon kicking the ball around with the kid.

“Hey, thought you’d never join me,” comes a soft voice from behind him.

He turns around to a view that knocks the breath out of his lungs.

Lisa looks gorgeous in her white, summer dress. With her black hair’s so fluffy, falling on her shoulders in gentle waves. With her smile’s so wide, vibrant and inviting. She pats the free spot on the blanket, beside her. She’s been waiting impatiently for him to join her on this picnic.

She’s been waiting for so long, hasn’t she? Feels like a whole lifetime or two ago.

“Come on, I’ve got something for you, baby,” she coos, reaching into the huge picnic basket.

She pulls out a paper plate with a perfect triangle slice of pie on it. Its scent’s what, at last, forces Dean’s legs to move. They carry him to where he wants to be, despite the feeling, deep in his stomach, that he should turn away and leave as fast as he can. And it doesn’t tell him why.

He sits down, right next to her. He can’t take his eyes off her, so charmed, savoring her beauty. It’s like he sees her for the first time and for the millionth time, all at once. He could never get enough of her.

“I hope you like it,” Lisa says, scooping a bite of the pie on the fork and lifting it to Dean’s lips.

Hesitant, Dean opens his mouth.

The crust crumbles on his tongue like it’s nothing. The filling must be cherry, judging by the intense red color of it, but all Dean can taste is sweet and metallic.

And he wants more of it. He needs more of it.

His eyes follow the fork to the plate and back to his mouth and again. He barely swallows one bite, he leans forward for another. He can’t stop himself, he won’t stop himself. Lisa’s hand can’t work fast enough, though she tries.

She’s getting sloppy, the red mush drips off the unsteady fork. Soon the red gets on everything, spattered drops bloom like flowers on her white dress, like bruises, they spread on her calves, almost as pale as the fabric.

Dean crawls on her, to cut the distance, cut the loss. Lisa’s fingers break off the crust and deep into the mush. He licks it off her skin like a famished animal. He takes and he takes and he takes until there’s not a drop of the red sweetness left.

He moans with pleasure as he pulls away.

“It was amazing,” he says, but when he looks up, Lisa’s no longer there, on the stained blanket. “Lisa?”

His head shoots up, eyes sweeping frantically over the field of withering grass, over the long shadows covering the park. He can’t see her anywhere, not a trace of her white dress, her pale skin.

“Lisa? Lisa! Where are you?”

Dean preferred the wrath.

He preferred her shattering screams.

Those were easier to stand than her silent presence, a quiet sort of anger. The repose.

Those were easier to stand than her crying.

Making her cry was the last thing he ever wanted to do. She was his world. Not for a long time, but for enough time to become his home. A person, a place he could always come back to. No matter how long the road, how tedious. No matter how difficult the hunt. He could return to her. She’d always be there. He could relax and forget everything that happened on the hunt. At home, with her, with Ben, he could just be, almost normal. Just a guy with his love, not a hunter. Not until another hunt called him. There were no alpha vampires to worry about, no new weird, no extra monsters.

Not any monsters, not there.

There, he could spend hours teaching Ben to take care of Baby. Ben enjoyed it. Dean wasn’t sure if it was the mechanics that interested him or if he just liked spending time with Dean.

His new father figure.

It wasn’t a great thing. Dean wasn’t a great role model, he’d never been. He’d always known he couldn’t be a father. Not with the booze and gun powder and terrible life decisions.

But when he was home, he was enough. He wasn’t bad, he wasn’t all crap.

And then he wasn’t. He was all crap and more. God, one night, one moment.

If only he could turn back time.

“Did you at least go to see how he’s doing?” Lisa says.

He doesn’t answer. She knows.

He should have. He wanted to. He had plenty of time between the messed up hunt game he created and spectacularly lost.

But he didn’t dare to go near him.

He could have found out what happened to Ben. The social services must have taken care of him. Hopefully, Lisa’s sister has taken care of him and adopted him. She loves his nephew and she wouldn’t let him get hurt or get lost in the system.

He’s fine, he must be. As fine as a teenager can be after losing his mother. And losing his mother like that.

To the guy he considered his father figure. Maybe would grow on to consider his father, one day.

What a disgusting cliche had Dean become. One of those drifter guys, raging alcoholics who in a fit of rage murder their women. That is what he is. Both to the neighborhood, local news, freakin’ posterity. That is what he is to himself, too. Objective truth and all that.

The bloodlust doesn’t matter. The bloodlust was just an excuse.

What could he have done? In that moment, when the scent of her blood overtook all of his senses? Was there something he could have done? Pushed her away, pulled away, ran out. He should have been stronger than he was. Weak, weak, weak, pathetic Dean.

As weak as he was in Hell when he gave up. When he said yes. When he picked up the blade. He chose torture to others just so the pain would stop. And how did that end?

He chose to kill her just so the hunger would stop. He did.

“Are you hungry now, Dean?”

“Like hell.”

“As hungry as you were that day?”

He mulls over the answer. He looks into himself.

“No, not as much,” he decides, a little surprised. “Not yet. Nothing can compare to that. It was the only thing on my mind, like nothing else existed but that hunger.” He remembered that hunger, that bloodlust all too fucking well. This wasn’t it. This hurt. It felt like his insides were trying to dissolve. But it wasn’t so all-consuming as his first bloodlust. Was it a matter of the first feeding? The biological directive to inadvertently become the beast? Or was it just a matter of time until blood became the only thing on his brain, red, hot, burning. “How long has it been?”

“Months,” she replies, vaguely. “At least since that.” She points to the decaying carcass of the rat, Dean’s latest victim.

“Months,” Dean echoes.

How much longer will this take? He’s so fucking tired. He’s so fucking ready to die.

“We’re here together for a long haul,” Lisa says, which is not at all comforting.

It was a different kind of dream, tonight. Even as he woke up, it felt too real in a way dreams never are.

For the first time, in a long, long time, Lisa wasn’t in it. He couldn’t place her in the scenario, not in the present, not in the past. Maybe in that made up life, she was never in the picture at all. Maybe there, he never met her and she never died. For one night, for longer, he lived in a world where the constant pain didn’t exist, at all.

There was him and Sam, following the pattern of suspicious deaths, straight from the Final Destination. Just a hunt like any other. Like the good, old days. And it felt great to be back in the saddle that he never even knew he abandoned. It felt great to live without the burden. To live, at all.

He could have had that still. How could everything go so catastrophically wrong in just one night?

Unlike the good, old days, though, in the dream world, saved by Balthazar, the Titanic never sank. The weirdest, most random thing Dean’s brain could have come up with. Was it some freudian dream symbolism thing? If Dean were to interpret it, just for kicks, would  _ he _ be the unsunk ship, spared by a whim of an angel?

Dean lets out a chuckle.

“What’s so funny?” Lisa asks, from her corner.

He shakes his head, brought back to his grim reality.

It was just a dream, after all.

“Why didn’t you move on, Lisa?”

She doesn’t answer, as she keeps stroking his overgrown hair. A gentle touch, just like lovers do.

He’s too weak to push her hand away, not just physically.

“You should have moved on,” Dean continues. He knows ghosts. Knows them too well. Staying behind—it never ends pretty. “This isn’t healthy or natural. You still can move on.”

“I can?” she asks, though it doesn’t sound like a question. More like a demand. “Tell me how.”

Dean doesn’t have a straightforward answer. If he did, solving ghost cases would go so much quicker.

If her body got burned like he hopes it did, she must have latched into an object, something Ben still has with him, probably.

Or maybe she didn’t need even that. Some ghosts are fine just latching onto life. Some have their unfinished businesses to take care of.

Some have teenage sons, left all alone, to watch over.

Some have their murderers to torment before they die.

So how is she supposed to move on?

By letting go? By walking towards the light that doesn’t want to shine in this craphole? Should she go see Ben, see how he’s doing, and say a goodbye he won’t hear? Accept what happened?

Accept what happened.

How’s she supposed to accept that? That she got her life ripped away from her by the man she loved and trusted?

So Dean doesn’t say anything. Lisa looks at him like she expected that. Of course, she did. 

The particles dance in the yellow sun. The light that flashes into Dean’s eyes, stings. But he doesn’t mind that much.

He’s got Lisa’s arm wrapped tight around him and that’s all that matters. Her head weighs on his chest, her steady breath tickles his naked skin. Her hair smells like cherry pie.

“Shhh…” he hums, as she stirs. He doesn’t want her to wake up. It feels so good right here, right now.

Maybe tonight, he’ll get to fall asleep in her embrace. Maybe tonight, at last, he’ll get to never wake up again.

“We shouldn’t be here,” Lisa murmurs, her voice weirdly high-pitched.

“What did you say?” Dean lifts his head, winces at another strike of light. But Lisa’s eyes stay closed. She must have been just talking in her sleep.

With his free hand, Dean swipes away a stray lock of her hair. With the gentlest brush of his fingertip, he traces the shape of her face, the line of her jaw, the contour of her lips. She’s so full of color, full or life. She’s safe.

Another flash of light.

Lisa shifts, her fingers bite into Dean’s shoulder.

“Is he dead? Oh God, is he dead?” she blurts out, panic growing in her voice.

She raises above him, her dark her obscuring her face. She’s trying to shake him, to wake him up.

“Stop, stop it!” Dean tries to push her away.

Another flash of light, and there’s nothing in his vision but the blackness of her hair.

“Hey, are you okay, man?” another voice joins. It’s not coming from Lisa’s mouth this time.

Lisa’s gone.

A different face hangs in front of him, an unfamiliar face. It’s not the sun but the flashlight that blinds him. It takes him a moment to remember the basement. But the people in it— No, they can’t be there. The door was closed and blocked from the inside. He secured it himself all that time ago.

“Who—Who are you?”

Doesn’t matter who they are. No one can be there. No one but Lisa and him.

It’s too dangerous.

“We found you here,” one of them explains, his words barely piercing through the rhythmic thumping filling Dean’s ears.

His voice sounds young. Both of them do. Too young to be hunters. College kids, probably, looking for a place to party or get high.

“Get out of here!” Dean tries to shout but it comes out weak.

He knows he won’t stay weak for much longer. The numbness in his limbs gives way to pins and needles. His muscles still remember how to hunt. The bloodlust, the survival is stronger than death.

And the fragrance of their young blood drowns out every stink of this place. Drowns out the last of Dean’s self-control.

But they don’t listen to him. “Do you need help?”

“I think he’s a junkie,” the girl with the flashlight says, moving the light off Dean’s eyes, at last, and on the piles of used syringes.

“Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help him.”

They keep talking, but Dean can barely hear them anymore. The rush of blood in their veins, the only thing Dean hears.

_ Lie down, _ Dean orders his body, as his muscles tense.  _ Stay down, don’t you fucking dare. _

But he can barely see anything but red. He can barely think of anything other than blood. He grasps the kid’s wrist. Dean’s body’s making choices for him, bypassing his brain. He’s up before he realizes it. He’s got the guy firmly stuck in his hold. Like an animal, he sinks his fangs into his neck. They’re not yet long enough to reach the artery, but they go through the skin like through butter.

Familiar, so familiar.

And then the blood pours on his tongue, so sweet. What a relief. He could just stand there forever as long as the liquid kept pouring into his mouth, into his throat, filling up his stomach that shoots up the freakin’ fireworks in happiness.

He can feel his body regenerating, his muscles getting stronger, his power coming back. Suddenly, it’s like the last months never happened. All this time, wasted.

But in this moment, he doesn’t care.

He makes gross sounds while the girl is screaming by the door, ready to run for her life. She chooses to save her friend, instead. She hits Dean across the head with something, but it’s not enough to put him down.

It opens Dean’s eyes, though. And when he looks down at the kid he’s devouring, the dark hair hanging down, the pale skin, the eyes staring at him in accusation.

It’s Lisa that he’s drinking all over again.

“Really, Dean? We’re going back to this?” she asks.

What the hell is he doing?

Back to his senses, he manages to control himself, tears himself from the sweet spring, backs out into the farthest corner. The kid drops to the floor.

But he’s not dead, he can’t be.

The girl runs to her friend, never letting her eyes off Dean. She manages to pull him up to his feet. He’s pale and weak on his feet, but alive. She drags him away, up the stairs.

Not until the bang of the shut door resounds does Dean let himself relax.

He slips down to the floor, head buried in his hands.

It was so close. So fucking close. He nearly murdered someone, again.

He’s too dangerous, even here, even locked for everyone else’s good. And starving himself? It’s too slow and now, he’d have to start all over again. This isn’t gonna cut it. It only makes him even more dangerous than he is when he’s fed. He should have known that, of course. But he naively thought if he just stays here, he won’t hurt anything again.

But he did.

And he’s gotta find a quicker way to kill himself.

He should have done it a long time ago.

He no longer remembers what stopped him before. Was it the cowardice?

Did he like having a way out?

Or did a quick death just not seem like a tough enough of a punishment?

Because anything else was just an excuse.

The time has come for vive la révolution to come for his head.


	4. Chapter 4

“A guillotine?” Lisa asks, amused.

Dean tips his head up to look at her. The sharp, wooden edge bites into his throat.

She’s leaning against the Impala, with her arms crossed. The high, summer sun shines through the missing roof down on her. Her skin nearly lost the sickly pale tone. If only Dean could forget…maybe he’d be able to make himself believe this is her, that this is their home. That everything’s okay.

“Yeah,” he croaks. “What’s wrong with a guillotine?”

Designing and assembling the device didn’t take him long. The planks and the rope he found right here. Acquiring the right kind of blade, heavy enough to slice right through his spine, was a bit more tricky. But that’s what black market is for.

The blade’s not attached yet, or sharpened. It’s lying in the corner, along with a bunch of heavy watermelon.

At least the testing part is gonna be fun.

“Doesn’t seem your style.”

Dean props himself on his arms and gets up. He raises an eyebrow at Lisa.

“What is my style?”

“Fight.”

Dean lets out a humorless laugh. What the hell is that supposed to mean? After all this time, after all this torment, this is what she’s got to say to him? Fight? Go down swinging? Rage against that good night?

What does it mean?

“There’s no fight, Lis,” he says, softly. She’s the last person he expected to hear it from. This version of her, at least. “I need this to be over. For everyone’s sake.”

“You don’t actually want to die, do you?” she says, softly. She’s miles away from the rage and despair. The months they spent together somehow changed her, too. That’s not the way it usually goes with spirits. “You just want this guilt to go away.”

“I need you to move on,” he replies, ignoring the rest of her words. Because, no, she’s not right. Miraculous absolution of his guilt wouldn’t fix a thing either. “Please, please, move on, Lisa. There’s nothing waiting for you, here, but heartache. You’ll only deteriorate and go mad.” He wishes it wasn’t so, but then, everyone would just stay, wouldn’t they? “You can’t stay here and protect him. If you must, go to Bobby, he’ll help you cross over. He’ll find a way, find what needs to be burned to set you free, or ghost shrink you or something. It’ll be fine. It’s not so bad on the other side. You’ll be better off there.”

Lisa gives him a half-hearted nod.

“We’re not talking about me, though, are we?”

But Dean’s not up for this conversation. It’s decided, there’s nothing left to talk about. He just shrugs and moves on to sharpening his blade, hoping that Lisa will listen to his advice once he’s gone.

She’s still there for him when the moment arrives. There’s sadness painted in her brow. Their honeymoon is over. The time has come to rid the world of one more of it’s pesky, dangerous creatures.

Dean’s tested the guillotine through and through, then cleaned all the sticky juice off it. It worked, every single time. Now, instead of watermelons, it’s his neck that rests on the block.

“One last time, I’m so sorry, Lis,” he says, from the bottom of his heart. He’s kinda glad his face is turned to the ground, when a stray tear rolls out his eye and drops off the tip of his nose.

The journey’s been so emotionally tiring, he’s gotten ten years older in the last nine months. But this is not the time to let it all out.

This is the time to go.

Dean shuts his eyes, his fingers find the releasing mechanism.

Here goes nothing.

The blade falls with a high-pitched whistle, a dull thump resounds in Dean’s bones.

But when he opens his eyes, his neck is still attached to the rest of his body.

Fucking anticlimactic.

When he lifts his head, only slightly, the sharp edge of the blade presses against the back of his neck. A trail of blood trickles down.

It takes him a bit of very awkward and very careful flailing to find the rope and pull it up without hurting himself. At last. he gets to climber out of the non-lethal deathtrap and lets out the rope.

The blade falls all the way down.

Dean doesn’t look Lisa in the eye.

So something got stuck, somehow. He’ll have to figure it out, make sure it doesn’t happen again. The mechanism caused no problems when he tested it. But it’s like they say, right? It’ll break the hundred and first time after a hundred perfect trials.

He cleans the entire device again and lets it dry overnight. He inspects every inch of it, as if it’s not an eighteenth century, gravity propelled apparatus, but some freaking clockwork machinery.

An hour later, he’s found nothing wrong with it. Literally nothing.

Annoyed, he blames it on Murphy’s law and, after a few more dry tests, he conducts a suicidio—take two.

And take three.

“Are  _ you _ doing this?” he shouts, staring dead into Lisa’s eyes. He’s completely lost his patience. There are only so many times he can drop that fucking blade on his own head.

“It’s not me,” Lisa says, calmly.

“If you’re fucking with me, I swear—” He doesn’t know what he swears. That he’ll banish her? Send her to Heaven himself?

“I’m not doing this, Dean,” Lisa says, firmer this time. “But if you want me gone, I can just go. This is getting sad to watch, you know?”

She doesn’t wait for his answer. She just disappears, leaving him alone with his faulty toy.

If it’s not Lisa, then there’s only one suspect left. Someone Dean hasn’t thought of in a long time. And he’d prefer it wasn’t him. Lisa’s ghost, at least, Dean will know how to deal with if he must.

Dean lays his head down, again, without any ceremony.

Take four—

“It’s not gonna be as bad as it’ll look,” Dean assures Lisa with a fake cheer in his voice, as he crawls up on the table of his new murderous device.

Lisa looks rather skeptical. And Dean doesn’t blame her. He’s not exactly excited about a spinning blade of a buzzsaw eating a path through his neck, either. But he’s gotta do what he’s gotta do. And it still beats the alternative.

“I can’t look at this,” she says, turning her head away.

What a shame. Dean hoped her face could still be the last thing he sees before his head rolls down.

It’s just a switch of two buttons. The first one brings the blade to life with a jarring buzz. The other puts it in a forward motion, a straight line across his neck. It’s not gonna be as fast as he’d like it to be, definitely not as fast and painless as the guillotine. But he’s been through worse. He’ll be fine.

Or rather, not be fine, which is the whole point.

Dean lies down, his neck on the mark. The constant clamour getting louder and louder as the blade nears his head. So agonizingly slow.

An inch away and Dean begins to regret his brilliant, at the time, idea. This is gonna hurt like a motherfucker.

Unless it breaks down in time. Unless the power goes out or the switch turns off on its own. Then he’ll know.

But it keeps getting closer. Dean can feel the blow of air on his skin. He shuts his eyes tight, his fists clenched so hard his nails bite into his skin. It’ll only be a few seconds ‘til he passes out from the pain. It won’t be so bad.

He could have shot his veins full of dead man’s blood. He should have thought of it sooner. It’s too late now, the blade’s nearly kissing his skin—

His body jolts down, as one side of the table cracks and falls. The force of gravity smashes his body against the ground and he rolls away, a safe distance from the blade that’s now cutting the air.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” he yells.

A broken leg of the table. That’s what saved him. A lucky coincidence. Except now. Because Dean doesn’t believe in coincidences.

Now, he knows exactly who’s involved here, throwing wrenches in his works.

“You fucker!” he calls out to Cas. He is the Titanic, after all. “What have I done to you? I don’t owe you living! For what? Cuz you brought me back? What do you want?!”

What kind of vindictiveness is this? What was it that Dean did that made him deserve this? Deserve almost a year of this suffering when all he wanted was to die?

Because now, everything makes sense. The hunters scared out of killing him, the locks that miraculously opened for the kids when Dean was, at last, done for.

Even the fucking rat, Dean’s sure.

It was all Cas, wasn’t it?

With the fury buzzing in his veins, Dean doesn’t think much when he grabs the machete from Baby’s trunk. If Cas wants him to suffer, he’s gonna suffer. But in the end of it, he’s gonna be fucking dead.

Dean takes a swing.

He’s no way to gain enough momentum, he doesn’t care.

“Try to save me now, fucker!”

Maybe a part of him expects Cas to swoop in, yet again, stop the swing of his arm, stop the blade from crushing his trachea.

But Cas doesn’t come.

And Dean’s out of breath, choking on his own bones, on his own blood, on the sheet of metal that’s stuck in his throat.

His arms go weak from the paralyzing pain, but he doesn’t let go. There’s no turning back now, so he pushes on. Even as he slides down on the wooden wall, he pushes on. He doesn’t think about what he’ll do when he gets to the spinal cord and his whole body goes limp.

Maybe this is enough to kill him already, if he just stays there like that. Dear God, let it be enough.

“You stupid—”

Lisa’s face appears in front of him, tears glistening on her cheeks. But there’s no paleness in her cheeks at all. She’s so full of color, so full of life.

“Look what you’ve done to yourself, baby,” she says as if her heart truly aches for him.

He doesn’t deserve this sweet tone, doesn’t deserve the look in her eyes. Just like she used to look at him, before.

With her palm, she cups his bloody cheek, as his split throat makes a disgusting, gurgling sound.

“It’s okay, Dean.” Her voice is like a balm, soothing the pain, soothing the fear. “I forgive you. Please, forgive yourself, too.”

He can’t do anything but stare at her, as his hand plops down to the ground. It’s okay. That’s how he wanted to die all along. So what if he hurts, so what if his vision begins to blur. At least the weight, the crushing, heavy weight that’s been on him for so long, finally lifts.

For a moment, he’s flying, without the ball and chain of his broken body and his twisted soul.

She stays with him, until the black flakes cover most of his vision and a quiet “I love you” cuts through the hum in his ears. Or maybe his suffocating brain made that up, it doesn’t matter.

Now, at last, he gets to die.

He deserved it.

“Oh, Dean. What have you done to yourself.”

It’s not Lisa’s voice, this time. It’s a deep, saccharine tone.

_ Fuck off, _ Dean thinks, unable to say it out loud. But he’s still got the satisfaction. Dying will be his biggest fuck off of all.

There’s a palm on his cheek, where Lisa’s hand just was. And, like that, Dean’s neck is healed. The machete falls down to his lap.

“No. No, no, no!” Dean screams, as soon as a new breath fills his lungs.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He can’t be whole again. He was so close. He was so close, he can’t do it again. He can’t go through all of this again.

“Why? You fucker, why?”

“You didn’t think I’d let you die, did you?” Cas says, his head cocked to the side. “We had this conversation.”

There’s something wrong with him. In his movements, his self-righteous tone. In the gentle, mocking smile on his face.

It’s almost like he’s not Cas, at all. Just someone,  _ something _ , wearing his body. But it’s not. Somehow, Dean knows it.

And he remembers that conversation, of course. He opens his mouth to spit what he thinks about it, about everything that it led to, straight into Cas’s face, but Cas speaks again.

“You must stop beating yourself over Lisa.” His words catch Dean off guard. “I’ve seen her in Heaven. She’s at peace.”

“In Heaven?” Dean echoes. He didn’t expect her to leave right away. That’s good.

“She was a good person. The reaper took her there, right away.”

Right away? That’s not possible. She couldn’t have gone to Heaven right away.

“So she wasn’t—” Dean doesn’t finish, just keeps staring at Cas surprised. ‘Cause if she’s been in Heaven all along… Fuck, Dean’s head’s been worse than he thought. For months, he’s talked to a hallucination.

It was a hallucination that gave Dean absolution. Not Lisa. The thought sinks in and Dean braces for impact. Braces for the guilt to return with triple the force.

But, somehow, it doesn’t.

“She wasn’t what, Dean?” Castiel asks, his tone so…suspicious. Dean really doesn’t want to answer. 

He doesn’t even want to be in the same room with him. What the hell happened to him?

“No, nothing, nevermind.”

Luckily, Cas doesn’t prod on. He changes the topic himself.

“Sam is gonna be so glad to hear that you’re okay.”

“So he’s still looking for his missing guinea pig, huh?” Dean mutters bitterly.

“No, he’s looking for his brother. I aided his affliction,” Cas boasts, his chest puffed. “He’s no longer missing his soul.”

“His soul?” Dean echoes. But, really, he doesn’t care. If Sam’s fine now, if he’s back to who he used to be, that’s good enough for Dean. He knows Sam’s gonna be just fine without him.

He wants to ask Castiel if Sam still hunts or if he maybe settled down somewhere, found a girl. He doesn’t know why that even comes to his mind. Since when does finding a girl ends well? Though, he can hope that for Sam it will.

But he also wants the interaction with this brand new Castiel to end, preferably with Dean dying.

“What the fuck happened to you, Cas?”

“Oh, you noticed?” Cas says smugly. “I’m so much more powerful now than you can imagine. I fixed everything. I killed Raphael. I’m the new god now.”

God? What kind of crap—

“Before you ask, no, I can’t fix you, I’m sorry. Even God has his limits. This is one of the rules of the universe, that vampires will stay vampires.”

Dean rolls his eyes. He should care more about it now, but he can’t seem to make himself. “Sure, of course it is. Can we go back to the god thing, now?”

“I opened up Purgatory, I used the filthy souls in it to gain power,” he explains in cliffnotes. Although, Dean’s sure he would love to talk about it for hours. “That is why I couldn’t let you die. If only you listened—if only you wanted to listen, really listen—I could have told you that. And neither of us would have spent all that energy on this whole little, literally suicidal mission of yours.”

“Sure, scooping up soul whenever you need power-ups sounds healthy. Well, anyway. Can I die now, pretty please?”

Dean shouldn’t be this blasé about it. Cas as God? That’s surely gonna end well, for everybody. The guy’s not the best at decision-making. But, well, Dean’s too tired to bother with that. He’s gonna leave it to Bobby and Sam and all those asshole hunters who didn’t wanna help Dean out (as if the cowards would defy Cas now that he’s god if they were scared to defy him as an angel.)

Dean just wants to be out of commission. And Purgatory seems to be in need of new sublocators right now.

“Reaching to Purgatory is not that simple. And no, Dean. You can’t die now. You still don’t understand. I will  _ never _ let you die. You can’t die. Not you. You’re far too precious for it. You could say you’re my weak spot, if you haven’t noticed that yet.”

“Come on dude, what, you gonna tell me you love me, next? ’Cause if you do, if you care about me at all, please, do this, for me.”

But Castiel only smiles, very creepily.

“You’re going to live, Dean. You’re going to live for a very long time. And you’ll bear witness to the brave new world I will create. And you’ll come to appreciate what you’ve become. Vampires aren’t monsters. Vampires adapted. Just like you, Dean. You’ve always been so good at adapting. I’d say it suits you well.”

“Cut the crap.”

“You haven’t seen what I can do, Dean. But you’ve seen how efficient I am. If you try to kill yourself again, I will stop you. If you harm yourself, I will come to heal you. If you try to starve yourself again, which, by the way, not the smartest idea you’ve ever had, I will keep sending you people to feed on, and, unless you make an effort to learn to control yourself, instead of denying what you are, you will never be able to deny yourself a hot meal. And you don’t want to hurt people, do you?”

Castiel leaves him like that. Message received. Cas won’t let him die. Every breath Dean takes and all that.

But he’s gonna get bored eventually. He’s gonna get busy. One day, even if Dean has to wait a long, long time—and he’s got that time—he’s going to find the right moment when Cas can’t catch him and he will end this.

Even if only out of spite.


	5. Chapter 5

The birds in the trees seem to stop their singing as they watch Dean stalk his prey. He’s threading through the woods on his tiptoes, not making a sound. He can’t scare it off, he can’t risk it. He must feed today. It’s been too damn long.

His victim stops in a perfect clearing. Dean finds a spot a few yards away, from which he can aim. He draws the string, puts an arrow on it. He needs to set the target just right, straight in the back of the neck—the spine. Paralyze, don’t kill. Don’t torture more than necessary.

He aims precisely and lets the arrow out. Years of practice sure have paid. The deer falls instantaneously. Now he’s gotta be quick.

He approaches the animal with a knife. His fangs pop out at the sight and smell of the blood seeping from the wound. But they wouldn’t do much good here, their sharp points hardly reaching past Dean’s teeth, they’d barely graze the animal’s skin. Humans though—he slides his tongue along the sharp ridges—humans’ fragile necks would give in too easily. Looks like he’s in for a dentist appointment, very soon.

But he doesn’t want to think about it now. He just wants to eat, at last. He wants the gross, non-satiating blood to force its way down his throat as he’s trying not to vomit. He must keep it down, no matter how bad it tastes, how uncomfortable it fits in his stomach. He won’t get to feed again for a while.

He goes straight for the jugular artery with the point of the knife, he cuts it along to give himself a nice, strong spring of blood. Still, drinking the animal dry takes way too damn long and it’s not at all enjoyable. But it keeps him fed and it keeps him sane. He needs perfect clarity and control if he’s to remain himself, let alone go to town.

Once the deer’s veins refuse to offer Dean a single drop more, Dean drags the carcass back to his cabin. He spends the next few hours, meticulously skinning the animal and packing its meat to sell it in town.

It’s been years since he moved here, but he keeps away from people. He’s only kinda known as that hermit guy who brings meat every now and then. He knows people too. He knows their names, knows a thing or two about them. But, most, he never even spoken a word to.

But that’s alright. He’s not here to have friends. He’s here to not hurt anyone. He’s here to wait the new god out.

“What’s god been up to, lately?” he asks right away, as he approaches the bartender, whose eyes are fixed on the tv, as he polishes a glass.

“Somewhere down south I think,” Tom answers, serving him his regular beer, “dealing with the sea monsters, because those are a thing too, these days.”

“Of course they are.”

Dean can’t help but think about this as an opportunity. Maybe if Castiel is so busy so far away, Dean will manage to do what he’s here for.

“By the way, someone asked about you.”

Dean lifts his eyes from the beer. This doesn’t bode well. No one has got business asking for him.

“About me?”

“Yeah, I was just as surprised.”

“Local?”

“Nope. Don’t know the guy.”

That’s even worse. “Freakishly tall, long hair?”

“Miss again. ‘Round my height, buzzcut. In his twenties, maybe. Kinda baby-faced. Definitely, not from around here.”

Dean’s stomach churns. All he’s got to go on really is the age. But that’s enough for him to hazard a good guess.

“You tell him where to find me?”

“Who do you take me for, Dean?” Tom says, nearly offended. “But truth be told, I got a feeling he’ll be watching you. I didn’t like the way he talked about you.”

Dean can bet.

“Thanks for the warning.”

“Got any idea who that is?”

“Maybe,” Dean answers, paying for his half-drunk beer. “But I hope I’m wrong.”

He comes back to his cabin same way he came. He’s got no intention of hiding. The only person he wants to hide from is the one person he _ can’t _ hide from. He doesn’t know how much longer he has to wait to lull Castiel’s vigilance.

Could today be enough? It hasn’t been the promised centuries yet, but Castiel’s gotta have more interesting things to do.

The man did follow him here. In fact, he wasn’t too sneaky about it. Dean noticed him all the way back in town, tailing his truck up to the forest.

He still stays a little behind, lets Dean park and get out of his truck. Get ready.

Dean’s ready, he’s always been. He’s fed so he should be good, not too dangerous even in the fight, if his instincts and self defense kick in. His teeth are just small enough to harm but not to open the guy’s vein.

And then the man comes face to face with him.

It doesn’t take Dean long to recognize it’s Ben. Against everything Dean’s ever wanted for him, he became a hunter. It’s the one, final punch to the gut for Dean. And he came here to avenge his mother and kill her murderer—the man who Ben once considered his father.

“Ben,” Dean says with deep sadness in his voice. He hasn’t seen him in years but he couldn’t not recognize him. He’s still got the same eyes, the same face. Except there’s so much darkness behind his eyes now.

What did he have to sacrifice walking this path? How much has he lost? Dean knows the answer, there’s a pattern to hunters’ lives. It’s never all roses. There’s always loss and tragedy and death and seeing things no child, no adult should see even in their nightmares.

And then, there are nightmares.

“I found you, finally. You weren’t easy to track down.” His voice is deeper, of course, but still familiar.

Dean wonders if Castiel put some charm around him to hide his location, because really, he hasn’t moved in years. Even in the middle of the Canadian wilderness, he was an easy target. Of course he doesn’t doubt Ben’s tracking skills.

“You don’t have to do this, Ben,” Dean says, though he knows it’s a stupid thing to say. Ben swore his revenge that night. He’s got a right to it.

It still hurts to think about that boy, that sweet boy who was so good at mechanics, at fixing things, who was so full of life, now taking one. Even if just a vampire’s.

‘Cause vampires ain’t human, of course. And killing vampires is what hunters do. And Dean’s got more than enough blood on his hands to warrant a hunt on his head. One person, more than enough.

“Do what? Kill you? Avenge my mother? Avenge my childhood and my ruined life?” he counts. “I should have known, _ mom _ should have known, the moment you arrived at our home, without a warning. But you played such a sweet guy and I fell for it like some dumbass child in need of fatherly love. But I should have known by the alcohol, by the monsters. You were always a killer. You’d known it all along, hadn’t you?”

“I did,” Dean admits. “But that was never supposed to happen. You know that. You know vampires.”

“What, are you trying to absolve yourself, now?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Dean says. Though he did. He dreamt of it once, a long, beautifully tragic dream. “I was guilty, it was all on me, alright. I swear to you there isn’t a day when I don’t think about Lisa, about what I’ve done to both of you. I deserve to die. I just don’t want you to be the one who kills me.”

“So I don’t deserve my revenge?”

“Revenge won’t make you feel better.”

“Sure, I’ve heard that before. So what? At least you’ll be gone. And not living this cute little life you built for yourself. This, this you don’t deserve.”

Dean nods. He agrees, of course he does. He didn’t deserve the last decade of peace, when the only monsters he thought were those inside his head.

“Okay then, let’s not prolong this. I just gotta warn you, it might not be as easy.”

“I killed vampires before. Even ones as smug as you.”

“Okay then, alright, kid. Good luck.” Dean puts his hands behind his back and laces his fingers together to make sure he doesn’t harm the kid.

He stands up with his head raised high, neck bare. He’s not gonna put up a fight. All he hopes for is that he’ll finally be put out of his misery, and that Ben gets his revenge too and can move on. That they can all move on.

With vengeance burning in his eyes, Ben pulls out his machete and charges.


End file.
